


Fairy Tales

by giratinas



Category: BanG Dream! Girl's Band Party! (Video Game)
Genre: Adulthood, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Background Relationships, Coming Out, Depression, Drama, F/F, First Love, Fluff, Humor, Post-Graduation, Romance, Separation Anxiety, mentions of nsfw
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-13
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-04-25 05:54:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 45,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22273747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/giratinas/pseuds/giratinas
Summary: Kokoro undergoes a vital revelation about who she is in the face of adversity. Misaki, ever vigilant, is there to pick up the pieces.
Relationships: Okusawa Misaki/Tsurumaki Kokoro, Seta Kaoru/Shirasagi Chisato
Comments: 53
Kudos: 171





	1. The Ringmaster

**Author's Note:**

> looks like it's time. if you want to talk bandori or fics on twitter, you can follow me @nicofeathers. my account is private, but feel free to request.
> 
> this story is not a handbook for real life so please keep that in mind while you enjoy it.

Beneath the gleaming lights of the stage, Misaki reveled in the familiar heat that came hand-in-hand with impassioned performance, the crowd beyond nothing more than a blur. Even with her limited vision and the lights from above, she could still hear them roaring, cheering, and calling their names. Her damp tank top was clinging to her in uncomfortable places, but by now it was nothing more than a mild inconvenience. The costume weighed heavy on her shoulders, but she carried it and everything else with pride, something she’d quietly longed for in all of her mediocrity. Here in this moment, she could be someone else, and trade insecurity for dedication. Two years ago, Misaki had walked out of one life and into the next.

Sometimes, she felt as though she were in a dream. A long dream, wherein each and every moment had meant something, and every song was a memory she could live in again. There was a tightness in her chest that gripped her so thoroughly when she recalled the first time she had conquered her fear of being judged - an anger she had only for herself, born from lies she told to keep herself separated from friends she never wanted. Those uninvited feelings were so easily washed away by a girl who stood at the window in her memories, bathed in the glow of the sun and shrouded by curtains drifting softly in the summer breeze. She could hear the echoes of the carnival they’d all made together, the place where Misaki had decided who she wanted to be. 

She could never have made it there without them.

To her left there was Kanon, confident and glowing as she sat behind her drums and waved to the audience with nothing but joy in her eyes. She was as strong as she was bold, always a steady beat in the rhythm of the band to keep Misaki’s feet on the ground. Now she was clad in red and gold, an elaborate recreation of their very first uniforms, more stunning than ever before but familiar as always.

Beyond her was Kaoru, with her glamorous guitar cradled in her slender arms and eyes only for her captive listeners. She was still the same as she always was, now grown even taller, and maybe a little wiser. Her act carried on even now, years later, but to be anything else wouldn’t be fitting. There was nobody quite as charming as Kaoru, and she knew it.

Close to the edge of the stage was Hagumi, leaping to and fro even with her bass slung about her shoulders. She was just as loud as the crowd beneath them, itching to play and just as enthusiastic as ever. Hagumi had changed little, and Misaki was thankful for it. There were few people who could smile so contagiously in spite of the odds against her in the outside world. For now, she was in a different world, another space that was all their own in between reality and unrealized dreams.

When Misaki had first settled in to Hanajo, she had heard rumors and whisperings of someone strange and absurd, a girl that by all accounts should not have existed the way she did. There had always been an air about her, as if she were some otherworldly creature forced into a place she didn’t belong, a girl who did not and would not conform, who wouldn’t stand aside and watch but would rather take the reins and command the world around her instead of letting it shape her. Such confidence she had, to speak her mind in the face of cruel laughter and tell stories and songs from her heart. She was notorious. She was infamous. She was that fate, the one who found Kanon and Kaoru and Hagumi and an odd bear from the shopping district. There was just something about her that could never truly allow you to say no. It was a law of nature to believe in her, and believe in what she said. Nobody had been like Kokoro.

And still, nobody could compare. It was a sight Misaki had seen hundreds of times before. Kokoro was standing there at center stage, shining so brightly that it was hard to look anywhere else. She stood out so incredibly, so loudly, dressed to play her part as ringmaster in the fantastical circus she had created from nothing but happiness and sheer will. It seemed, in these fast-paced moments where it was hard to believe time existed, in a space between fantasy and reality, that Kokoro was someone who could do anything and go anywhere, and everyone was welcome to come along with her. There was always something new on the horizon no matter if they played on the same stage or somewhere new. Five strangers they had been, drawn together by an unrelenting force and the drive to become something else. 

Misaki was here, together with all of them, reluctant even now to admit that she reveled in who she had grown to be. She knew there was more to come, and other roads she could take, and one day she would have to decide for herself. Gone were her slow, lazy days filled with moderation and directionless wandering. Life was not  _ meant _ to be lived in moderation, and she also knew that she had reason to carry on and make herself into what she wanted to be rather than stand by and allow the world to happen around her. It was a revelation that she would never forget.

Once upon a time, Kokoro Tsurumaki gave her something to believe in.

\---

Little was more satisfying than bathing in the aftermath of a successful show. For Misaki, it meant a shower, a breath of fresh air, and as much water as she could drink at one time. All the air fresheners in the world couldn’t keep her completely free of the post-mascot smell and she was looking forward to changing her clothes. For now she was sat backstage with Michelle’s head off and a cold ice water in her hand, courtesy of her suit-clad friends. By now she wasn’t sure if they were there to look after Kokoro or if they were there to dote on herself.

The lights were dim behind the stage, a stark contrast to the blinding glow out in front of it. Cool down time was a chance to reflect on her performance, and think about what they could be doing better. It calmed her to consider progress. Improvements for next time, if she could successfully communicate what she’d observed. Mostly she needed to talk with Kokoro about drifting around the stage, but it was hard to dampen her fun. If it was important for Kokoro, then in the end it didn’t really matter.

“Misaki-chan?”

She was startled from her thoughts by a soft voice that had come from around the corner. Kanon emerged, already changed out of her stage outfit.

“Yeah, I’m here. Just taking a quick break.”

Kanon gave her a nod. “We’re almost ready. The crowd is nearly gone, and Kokoro-chan is looking for you.”

Misaki rolled her eyes and put her cup down. “Is she looking for me, or Michelle?”

“I told her Michelle had to go home right away, so she can’t come to the afterparty. Hagumi-chan seemed a little upset.”

“Well, it is what it is,” Misaki leaned back against the wall. “At least I don’t have to go in the suit. Tell Kokoro I’ll be there in ten minutes. I need a quick shower.”

Kanon nodded again, then retreated back towards the dressing rooms. Hello Happy was the same as it had always been, and yet at the same time Misaki couldn’t help but feel like they’d done nothing but change. It was a good kind of change, at least.

The suits materialized and carried the bear off to be cleaned while Misaki busied herself with a shower and a fresh hoodie. When her hair was dry, she set off in the direction Kanon had gone, a familiar walk she’d done hundreds of times before. She could already hear them from the other side of the door, making a party out of what was supposed to be a time to rest before the real party even began. Kokoro and Hagumi never ran out of energy, so it was to be expected. A distant “fueee” came from beyond and Misaki decided it was time to step in. She opened the door.

“Misaki!!”

“Mi-kun!”

Simultaneous shouts erupted from Kokoro and Hagumi, who immediately ceased what they were doing and ran full speed towards their target. Misaki shut the door behind her and braced herself for the incoming dogpile.

She caught Kokoro in both arms with practiced ease, and then spun around just in time for Hagumi to latch onto her back. She stumbled forward a bit, but straightened out as best she could. Kaoru only looked on, amused.

“I hope I didn’t keep you waiting too long,” Misaki told them as she waddled towards the singular couch. The dressing room wasn’t anything to write home about, but it did have a few comforts for weary performers. 

“Of course not!” Kokoro was shouting, likely still pumped up from the show. “What did you think of it?”

Kanon moved to take Kokoro in a hand-off, but Misaki waved her away with a rare smile.

“You mean the concert? It was amazing as always. I saw the whole thing.”

“Mi-kun, did you see me?!” Hagumi shouted from over her shoulder. “There were so many orange lights today!”

“Yes, I saw you. You all looked great.”

“Truly, we were all our own princes and princesses upon the stage today,” Kaoru waxed as she struck a pose. “Is it not truly magical? Nothing can compare to a song from the heart.”

Misaki sat Kokoro down on the couch and shrugged Hagumi off her back. She eyed Kaoru curiously. “Was that pun intentional?”

“What is intention if not the truth?”

“Kaoru-san…” Kanon trailed off sympathetically. 

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Misaki shook her head. She felt Kokoro pull on her sleeve.

“Misaki! Are you coming with us?”

Hagumi shoved a neatly wrapped croquette in her face. “Do you want a croquette?”

Misaki wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do about that. “Hagumi, how long has that been in your bag?”

She pulled the croquette away and looked at it forlornly. “Oh, hmm. I don’t know, now that you mention it!”

“I’ll eat it,” Kokoro reached for it, and Misaki grabbed her wrist.

“We don’t eat food with undisclosed expiry dates, Kokoro.”

“Is it really that bad?”

“If you want a stomach ache you can have it, but I’m not taking care of you later.”

A soft laugh interrupted them, and they all turned their attention to Kanon, who was still a safe distance away from the three -  _ probably four, by now _ , Misaki thought to herself - dummies.

“Did I say something funny?” Hagumi asked, leaning over the back of the couch.

Kanon shook her head. “These are just the moments I enjoy the most. It’s hard not to laugh when you’re having fun, right?”

“A sentiment I share,” Kaoru put a hand on Kanon’s shoulder. “We are who we are when we are one.”

Misaki let herself chuckle. “I guess it’s pretty okay sometimes.”

Kokoro stood up and took her hand. 

“It’s time to go! Do you think there’s cake?”

Misaki gave Kanon her best “help me” face, but let herself get pulled along anyway. 

“Aren’t you the one catering the whole thing?”

“I just said we needed food for a party. It’s a surprise, even for me!”

Misaki rolled her eyes, even though Kokoro wouldn’t see her as she pulled the door open. 

“This is your charity concert, I feel like you should be a little more responsible about these kinds of things.”

Kokoro stopped suddenly, half way out the door, and Kanon bumped into Misaki’s back. Somewhere behind them, she heard Kaoru trip. Kokoro turned around and took Misaki’s other hand, holding them up between them.

“All you need to worry about is having fun, Misaki. Leave the rest to the suit friends!”

What a world she lived in, where being told not to worry really did mean she didn’t have to worry. Would she really be Misaki though, if she didn’t? Someone had to do enough worrying for Kokoro as well, so it may as well be her.

Sometimes though… sometimes listening to Kokoro really was all she needed to do. She was feeling particularly good after the show, anyway. No use trying to convince herself she had to turn back into good ol’ pessimism extrordinaire the moment they stepped outside.

Also, cake would be nice. It certainly beat the mystery croquette.

\---

CiRCLE was bustling by the time they wandered out of the backstage area. It was a swarm of familiar faces who were there by invitation only, courtesy of the Tsurumaki family. Kokoro had declared quite recently that she wanted to contribute funding to a start-up music school for children, and that was more up their alley than anything they’d done before outside of the whole amusement park thing. The idea had quickly transformed into an entire spectacle, and Misaki had been busy for weeks coordinating the concert. Marina had agreed to donate the use of the venue, and so one-hundred percent of ticket sales would be passed on to charity. Doing things like this made Misaki feel important and useful. 

Perhaps Kokoro could have just given money away instead, but as of late she’d been doing her best to rely more on her friends than her absent family. Part of Misaki’s semi-frequent lectures about preparing for life in the real world, even though she suspected that wasn’t really something Kokoro would have to worry about.

Kokoro quickly transformed into socialite mode, falling into the cheers and congratulations from their other friends with practiced ease. Even Yukina was smiling. Nobody was in any place to judge a show put on for such a cause. Hello Happy wasn’t perfect by any means.

Hagumi followed her, because it seemed as though feeding off of each other’s energy kept them going for hours on end. Kaoru gracefully inserted herself into a conversation between Chisato and Aya, while Kanon accepted a cup of tea and a few kind words from Tsugumi. Misaki hung back by the door, hoping for the newly formed crowd to disperse. Arisa wandered over, scolding Tae and Kasumi and telling them to go sit down somewhere. She knew what it was like, and she was merciful. 

“Okusawa-san,” Arisa greeted her, handing her a cup of water. 

“I just drank an entire bottle,” she replied as she took the cup anyway. “I’m not that thirsty. How many times do I have to tell you to call me Misaki?”

Arisa shrugged. “Excuse me for being polite. Anyway I won’t keep you, I know you probably want to sit down. I’ll keep the idiots off your back.”

Misaki gave her a grateful smile. “Am I really so predictable?”

“We’re basically the same person, so yes.”

“Yeah yeah… I’m off to lurk in the corner. Don’t let Hagumi feed you a croquette.”

Arisa gave her a funny look as she walked off. They’d been talking a lot lately and it was nice to bond over their similar issues, as terrible as that sounded. 

Misaki made her way over to a table tucked away in the corner and sat down to observe from a healthy distance. There were tables full of food in the normally empty studio lobby, but she wasn’t particularly hungry. Social anxiety dictated that she wasn’t allowed to get up and eat food while trying to mingle at the same time, and so she chose to relax alone. Kokoro did a cartwheel and came dangerously close to kicking a table packed with desserts. She couldn’t even see where Kanon was from where she was sitting.

She sipped absentmindedly at her water. After a successful show, there always came this time of ease where they didn’t really have to worry about the next show quite yet, when she could let her brain stop coming up with elaborate plans to bring Kokoro’s fictional stage to life. This was precious time, where she could think about other things that weren’t related to the band. Unfortunately, the other things she had to think about were a little more pressing than which hospital they would hit up for their next gig. 

Kokoro, Hagumi, and herself were in their final year of high school. Their final semester altogether, in fact. They were on a timer, and none of them had really stopped to think about what that meant. It wasn’t even something any of them had seemed to consider last year, when Kaoru and Kanon had graduated, but that was mostly because they had already declared they were taking one gap year to continue playing with the band and work normal jobs to prepare for college. It was like they’d never left, especially since Kaoru went to a different school anyway. They still met up for band practice and Kanon still worked at the fast food place.

The future was catching up to them, fast. They needed to talk about it for real. Misaki knew it was looming over them, the clock slowly ticking down until the day they would walk out with their diplomas into what was honestly the complete unknown. That was how Misaki felt about it anyway. Surely it would mean the end of Hello, Happy World. Oddly enough, that notion didn’t scare her. It still just seemed so unreal, that one day it really would end. An afterparty wasn’t really the kind of place meant for deep thinking.

Kaoru and Kanon would be applying for their chosen universities soon. Hagumi was destined to become a butcher and she seemed happy enough about it. But what was Kokoro going to do? What about Misaki herself?

Well, Misaki did kind of know. If there wasn’t room for another composer in Tokyo, then she would make room. She felt like she could write any kind of music if she was determined enough. Of course, knowing what she wanted to do was one thing, actually being able to afford to do it was another…

“Misaki?”

She looked up, and Kokoro was sat across from her. She really had zoned out, if she hadn’t noticed Kokoro of all people.

“Hey. Enjoying yourself?”

“Always! I just saw you sitting all the way over here, so I came to see what you’re doing. You were looking really hard at the plate of cheese,” Kokoro tilted her head curiously.

Misaki felt herself heat up a little. She’d zoned out staring at the food, then.

“I wasn’t looking at the cheese. Just thinking about things.”

“Fun things?”

Misaki hummed. “I’m not sure yet. Probably more stressful than fun, if I start putting too much thought into it.”

Kokoro grinned at her and all her worries vanished. “Then don’t think about those kinds of things. I’ve never been stressed in my whole life!”

“Well I can’t just turn my brain off like you can,” Misaki jabbed, and right after that found herself sipping at an empty cup. She was thirstier than anticipated.

A familiar laugh rang though Misaki’s ears. “I’ll teach you how to do it if you want. Hina says bad vibes make your skin wrinkly.”

“Hina-san says a lot of things. If bad vibes wrinkled your skin I’d be a raisin by now.”

Kokoro laughed again, vibrant and more cheerful than anyone had any right to be. Misaki followed in her stead, happy for the silly banter. She really  _ was _ in a good mood. 

“Ah, you’re right! Could you imagine? Do you think you could still write songs if you were a raisin?”

“I wouldn’t literally be a raisin, Kokoro.”

“But it would be funny if you were.”

Misaki leaned back in her seat. “Sometimes I wonder what goes on in your head.”

Kokoro rested her head in her hands, elbows propping her up on the table, and smiled. “Well if you ever want to know, you can always just ask.”

All Misaki could do was hum, satisfied with the conversation and at her limit for interaction for the day. Now she was more inclined to think about sleeping. It was nice to be in the company of a less fast-paced Kokoro. She’d learned to take it easy sometimes, and for that Misaki was thankful.

Kokoro continued to watch her, and Misaki closed her eyes.

Tomorrow, life would carry on as it always had. And then another day would come, back to school, and then another day, and another… there sure were a lot of days in a year. How they had crammed so many adventures into the last two, she didn’t know. Back then she’d been so different, and the only person she’d known at Hanajo had been Rimi. Sometimes her experiences with Kokoro seemed too absolutely ridiculous to be real, and yet they had all happened, Misaki’s life flashing before her eyes on numerous occasions. Sitting across from her hyperactive friend at a table and doing nothing else was a luxury in comparison. It was safe.

“Are you going to sleep?” Kokoro asked her.

Misaki kept her eyes closed. “No. I’m just thinking again.”

“You’re doing an awful lot of that today. If I think too much then I forget what I’m thinking about.”

Misaki slouched until she was comfortable. “I know. Just a lot running through my mind lately.”

She heard Kokoro stand up, and then all of a sudden two hands were holding her cheeks and her head was being turned to the right. 

“Kokoro!” her eyes shot open and she grabbed Kokoro’s hands with her own.

“Well you don’t feel sick or anything, so why don’t you come see everyone?”

Misaki pulled their hands away from her face. “I’m not sick! And I’m not that tired. Why are you over here with me anyway?

Kokoro raised her eyebrows. “Oh, I wonder why too. I think I’m being responsible, like you said. I have to look after my friends after all.”

Misaki sighed, smiling nonetheless. “I think we need to have a talk later, but I get it. I’m fine though, really. You should be over there with Hagumi and Kaoru and everyone else. I know when I need to take it easy.”

Kokoro hummed, brows arched in concern, as if she didn’t quite believe the words coming out of Misaki’s mouth. “Well okay, if you say so. You just got this look in your eye sometimes. Kaoru told me eyes are windows to the soul. I don’t know what that means, but it sounds serious, don’t you think?”

“Kaoru doesn’t know what it means either,” Misaki muttered, “you don’t have to worry about me.”

“Oh, well okay. I just get a feeling sometimes.”

“You get lots of feelings, all the time.”

“I do!” Kokoro returned to her former state of perpetual smile. “I got that funny feeling like something big is coming, kinda like before a concert. It could be something wonderful.”

Misaki sat up and cracked her back. “Very vague. We’re graduating soon.”

Kokoro nodded. “We are, aren’t we? I suppose that must be it. You really do have all the answers, Misaki.”

Laughing awkwardly, Misaki tried to look anywhere else. “I wouldn’t say that. I’m just thinking logically. I’m sure it’s crossed all our minds at some point.”

Kokoro nodded again, and then it seemed she had run out of things to say. Her attention left Misaki in an instant, leading her into a brisk skip over to where Eve and Hagumi were talking about something over two handfuls of cupcakes. At least she’d waved on her way out. That was just the way she was, fluttering from one place to the next when she wanted to do something else.

Part of Misaki wondered if she’d hit a sore spot somewhere, resulting in a classic Kokoro conversation deflection. She was so complicated sometimes. It was hard to imagine what she would do later on, when she didn’t have Misaki around to answer questions for her all the time.

That was a funny thought. Kokoro left to figure things out on her own, while Misaki moved on with her life. Haha. Very funny…

Misaki frowned to herself, turning her attention back to her empty cup on the table. Perhaps she really did need to sit down and give everything a little bit more thought. Hagumi had problems. Who was she going to talk to, if not Misaki? Who was going to remind Kokoro to bring her wallet every time they went out? Would Kaoru lose her charm while they were apart, and let her act fall to the wayside? Questions she didn’t want to think about quite yet. Maybe it really would be better, just for now, to adopt Kokoro’s methods and banish the negativity from her mind before it kicked her to the ground. She  _ would _ deal with it, eventually.

She picked up her cup and stood, walking towards her friends with purpose. If the good times were going to change, then she may as well make the most of them while they were happening.

\---

After the wrap up, Misaki lingered long enough to say good-bye to Kaoru and Kanon. Being away from them now was different than being away from them back when they were all in high school together. They already seemed so much older. 

Hagumi still had the old croquette, and she was standing by the garbage can outside the studio talking with herself about whether or not it might be a waste to throw it out. If she didn’t come to school on Monday, Misaki figured she’d have to stop by and bring her something for her stomach. She had full custody of the troublemakers now that they were alone, so it was up to her to take care of them. 

Kokoro was on her phone, presumably with the suits. She was asking them for a car to drive the three of them home, which had long since become the norm. Hagumi’s house was a bit of a detour, but Misaki only lived fifteen minutes from Kokoro’s mansion in the same direction. It was nearly midnight by the time a sleek black van pulled up, and half-past hit just as Hagumi hopped out at the first stop.

The way to Hagumi’s had been loud, lush with conversation as if it wasn’t just about the middle of the night, while Misaki sat patiently waiting to go home. Now, with only herself and Kokoro together, it was quiet. Maybe she made Kokoro feel awkward. Unlikely though, Misaki was probably just making herself feel awkward. Maybe because she knew that Kokoro would prefer for the day to never end, so her friends didn’t have to go home. She had never said it aloud, and had never needed to. Misaki knew her well enough by now.

“Maybe we can do something tomorrow,” she blurted out. “We’ll see everyone again at band practice next week.”

Kokoro looked up and smiled, eyes lit up as if she hadn’t looked close to sulking half a second ago. “Oh, maybe we should go to Hazawa! I think Eve is working tomorrow, and she was telling me about the cool sword in my attic but we didn’t get to finish talking.”

“Right, right,” Misaki nodded. “I’ll text you later. I don’t know if Hagumi has work, but you can ask her.”

“Yes!” Kokoro whipped out her phone on the spot and began typing away, completely distracted from the weird silence they’d just been sitting in. Really, Misaki had a lot of homework to do that she’d been putting off for the sake of the concert they’d just had. She could get by on a couple hours of sleep, that was no big deal by now. As long as she had coffee in the morning. Homework just seemed less important, in the grand scheme of things.

What  _ was _ the grand scheme now, anyway? For all of them, collectively. She heard from Arisa every now and then about Popipa’s newest triumphs, like playing at Budokan or finally beating Roselia for the popular vote. Sayo told her they were going to play in Osaka soon, like on an actual tour or something. Maya had recently signed a second contract with the agency that managed PasuPare, along with her friends. She didn’t know what Afterglow was up to but it was probably important.

So what was Hello Happy to do for their big finale? Kokoro seemed satisfied with what they had, and Misaki supposed she could be too. It just seemed like not doing anything more special than usual might be something of a waste, when they would all be living their own lives soon. Motivation was sparse anyway, unless Kokoro came to her asking for something. If she was going to become an independent composer then she would have to come up with her own ideas eventually, she supposed.

“Misaki? You’re home.”

She blinked and Kokoro was ruffling her hair. She hadn’t even noticed.

“Hagumi can’t come but we can still go, right?”

Oh yeah, the cafe. Misaki removed Kokoro’s hand from atop her head. “Yeah, of course. Bring your homework.”

“I did all mine already. Do you want me to finish your English for you?”

Misaki froze for a moment. “Hey, didn’t I say we shouldn’t talk about that?”

Looking around, Kokoro pointed at the empty car, the front cabin separated from them by a black tinted screen. “But nobody’s here?”

“ _ Still _ ,” Misaki emphasized, “you shouldn’t talk about how you do someone else’s homework. Just in case.”

Kokoro shrugged and smiled regardless “Okay! Well I’ll do it anyways. Have a good sleep!”

Misaki mumbled out a thank you and let herself out of the car. It wasn’t her fault she was terrible at English and Kokoro was like, basically native level. She sounded like it, anyway. Kokoro doing her English work would shave at least an hour off her projected completion time, which would leave her with maybe four hours of sleep if she was diligent. Her life was a complicated balance of doing too much because she just wanted to do too much. 

From time to time she wondered what it might be like to live a simpler life, without all the hobbies and the borderline caffeine addiction. There were few things by now that could make her life  _ more  _ complicated than it already was. It would take a lot to surprise her, that was for sure.


	2. Scandalous

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> misaki gets wrapped up in things she doesn't want to get wrapped up in

The start of every school week was slowly becoming more troublesome the less sleep Misaki was able to cram into her already self-destructive schedule. She was fully aware that, over time, she had taken on more responsibility than any one high school student should ever have, but it felt like the right thing for her to do and so she did it. It was nice to be depended on. As she lay in her bed, staring blankly at her ceiling while her alarm screamed for her to wake up, she wondered if that dependency was a little misplaced.

Misaki got up every morning, begrudgingly. Not that she didn’t want to go to school or anything, rather it was more like she didn’t want time to move forward, and it would be nice if it could stay still for a moment so she could mentally catch up. The sun shone directly into her eyes through her window, since she’d forgotten to close the drapes before passing out. She sighed, grasping around for her phone beneath her pillow, where it lived all night just in case someone had to call her about something important. Unlikely as it was, being prepared for anything was a way of life she had needed to adapt to.

She managed to turn off her alarm, then pushed herself up from her pillow. Her eyes felt heavy, as they did every morning, but it would wear off by the time she was out the door. Thankfully she slept on the floor, so she could drag herself around without standing for a while if she really wanted to. She might feel embarrassed for herself, if anyone knew what she was like in the mornings sometimes. This morning though, she stood up, rubbed her eyes and spared little more than a brief glance around her plain looking room, grabbing her uniform off her closet door handle and shuffling out of her sleepwear.

This past weekend had felt long, mostly because of the concert, she figured, and probably the homework she’d barely finished sometime around two in the morning. It was like being energy jetlagged. She could feel it in her bones. A cup of coffee and a muffin later, she was on her way out the door with a textbook-laden school bag.

For a little over a year, she’d walked to school with Kanon almost every morning. Summer vacation had helped her forget that when she went back to school in September, there would be no Kanon waking up at the same time and walking down the same sidewalk as Misaki so she wouldn’t get lost. On the way home, she still had Kokoro, but Kokoro was driven to school in the mornings for reasons unknown. There had never been an appropriate time to ask her why she didn’t just walk. Misaki was thankful for the peace that early, in any case.

Now, Misaki put in the extra effort to detour in the direction of Arisa’s house. She wasn’t Kanon, but she filled in the hole left behind well enough for now. She came upon the front gates just as Arisa was letting herself out, and caught her whispering goodbye to her beloved bonsai.

“You heard nothing,” Arisa told her sternly as they fell into step. “You never have and you never will.”

“It’s too early to be threatened, we haven’t even made it to school yet,” Misaki replied, “at least let me get to the end of your street.”

“Well I never said you had to walk all the way over here. Besides, when you walk with me you run the risk of also running into Kasumi. That should deter you more than anything.”

“I think I can handle her. What I can’t handle is calculus. What did you get for number ten on page two?” 

Arisa wrinkled her nose. “Don’t you do all the finances for your band?”

“I used to keep track of everything, but honestly it was always pretty pointless,” Misaki explained, eyes focused on the sidewalk. “With like, you know…”

“I guess so. You guys really can do whatever you want, huh?” 

Misaki waved a hand at her. “We do things differently, it doesn’t really matter. I’m still getting worse at math.”

“You should be doing all your homework yourself anyway. It’s about integrity, Okusawa-san.”

“Misaki,” Misaki attempted to correct her, although Arisa was never likely to drop the habit. First names were for people she wanted to scold, Misaki had learned. “I only asked you about one question.”

“How long has it been since you’ve done your own English homework?”

Misaki froze and whipped around to face Arisa, her cheeks already hot with embarrassment even as she thought about denying the accusation. “I told Kokoro not to tell anyone. I do it when I have time.”

Arisa shrugged, and Misaki knew she didn’t really care but it was likely that bickering made them both feel alive, so their conversations were always like this. “Don’t get mad at her, she didn’t say anything. I was at Hazawa-san’s cafe yesterday for like ten minutes and you didn’t even notice me standing behind you.”

“Well, normal people don’t go to cafes to stand around behind people who are minding their own business,” Misaki, still flushed, allowed herself to continue walking. “Wait, Kokoro didn’t see you either?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Whatever, just don’t tell anyone. Time is a hot commodity and sometimes I need more of it.”

They rounded the corner, and blended in with a peppering of other students. It was a beautiful day to be discussing nothing that mattered with someone who really understood where she was coming from. 

Arisa bumped Misaki’s arm with her elbow. “If that helps you sleep at night, then sure.”

At the very least, Misaki felt awake now. She had to be awake, because the second she stepped through those familiar iron gates, she was likely to be bombarded by her very… enthusiastic friends. Sometimes she really,  _ really _ missed Kanon.

She found herself missing most people she knew, more frequently than before. They’d all been there together on the weekend, catching up and chatting while Misaki kept to herself. The feeling she had wasn’t really one she might have if she were missing a close friend, like Kaoru or Kanon, rather it was missing the familiar faces. Seeing them around the school was enough to remind her that there were others like her, enveloped into the frenzy of the modern girl band. Chisato was not there, nor Sayo or Aya. Eve was around, sharing a class with Hagumi, and Arisa, and… well, everyone else. Misaki would have been alone in 3-A if not for Kokoro.

It was Kokoro who stood there at the gate every morning waiting for her, alongside Hagumi, happy as anyone could be at the start of a new school week. They said their hellos and then Hagumi split off, following Kasumi and an already exasperated Arisa. The procession was all routine by now. 

Kokoro sat behind Misaki, for maximum invasiveness tactics and so she could pass notes, which she curiously never got in trouble for even if she was very obvious about doing it. There were rumors about Kokoro that originated from her ties to the founding of the astronomy club, but she was a good student anyway so Misaki let the rumors die in her ears. There were a dozen crumpled bits of paper in Misaki’s school bag by now, only a week into the semester, and most of them were just drawings of Michelle or smiley faces. Sometimes if she was lucky there were lyrics she could tuck away for later.

Today Misaki did her best to focus, as their teacher was talking about the standardized test collectively hated by every high school student in Japan, something they would be writing only five months from then alongside post-secondary entrance exams. Contradictory to her poor homework habits, she’d actually become diligent in exploring her options and preparing for alternative outcomes. With mediocre grades at best, she needed a backup. She could hear Kokoro behind her, fidgeting with her coloured pencils and no doubt paying next to no attention to the current subject. It crossed Misaki’s mind that perhaps it didn’t matter whether Kokoro was listening or not. She was a Tsurumaki, so there was probably some kind of inheritance plan for whatever it was her parents did.

That sure was a thought. What exactly did that mean? Was Kokoro going to become some kind of CEO? She imagined her dressed in business attire complete with a clipboard. The vision left a sour taste in her mouth. As wrong as it seemed, at least she would have an easy life. 

At lunch they ate together with Hagumi and Misaki kept relatively quiet, something that hadn’t gone unnoticed by either of her friends. Kokoro accused her of thinking too much again, which was likely the case.

They all sat together on the bench outside in the courtyard, like they did nearly every day. Hagumi was showing off her hair, which she hadn’t cut all summer and had barely grown a couple inches anyway. Misaki hadn’t even noticed until she was told, and supposedly Hagumi was measuring it almost every morning. Funnily enough, Kokoro  _ also _ hadn’t cut her hair all summer except for her own bangs, and now she sat on it all the time, which was funny to tell people about but not so funny when it got caught on things or picked up gum from benches like the one they were sitting on. Inconvenient as it was (Misaki much prefered her more manageable, average length), there was no denying how eye-catching those golden locks were. Would they be soft to touch? Really, she needed to stop comparing herself to her friends. She couldn’t help being boring next to them. 

While she was doing her best to keep to herself today, Misaki couldn’t help but turn an ear to Hagumi when she brought up that something strange was apparently going on with Aya.

“What kind of strange thing?” Kokoro asked her, already enamoured with the mystery.

“Nobody knows!” Hagumi replied, “some girls were whispering about it during PE today. They said it was scandalous.”

“Aya-senpai doesn’t even go to school here anymore,” Misaki interjected. “If it’s some kind of rumor then I don’t think we should gossip about it.”

“Well, she’s our friend too. I wonder about my friends all the time,” Kokoro told her.

Misaki sighed quietly and tucked her chopsticks neatly into her bento. “The girls in our class used to whisper about you two all the time as well, and you knew they weren’t good things.”

Kokoro gave her a smile. “I don’t think anyone thinks that way anymore. They might be saying good things about Aya, and I’m curious if something amazing happened that we missed!” 

“Well, she didn’t say anything on the weekend so I have my doubts,” Misaki pointed out. “I just think you should both be careful. I don’t want you getting caught up in rumors too.”

Hagumi wore a thoughtful look. “Well, Aya-senpai  _ did _ always say an idol’s image is important. Hagumi doesn’t really know what that means, but that’s what all the whispers are about.”

“That means you should  _ definitely _ avoid talking about it. Look, remember when Pasupare were on TV for that gameshow, and Shirasagi-senpai had to draw a dog? Every news article about that event talked about how she drew the dog and nothing else.”

“I thought she drew it wonderfully!”

“Yes Kokoro, I’m sure you did. But that was all anyone talked about for weeks. I’m sure Aya-senpai knows people are saying things about her, no matter what it is. Shirasagi-san didn’t want to hear about the dog drawing and I’m sure Aya-senpai wouldn’t want us talking about… well, whatever’s going on now.”

“What does scandalous mean anyway?” Hagumi asked.

“Bad things. Just don’t get involved, alright?”

“If you say so,” Kokoro agreed at last, “then we won’t talk about it. I do wonder though! Hopefully it really is something good.”

Misaki straightened up in her seat and did her best to smile back. “I hope so too. We can leave it at that.”

That seemed to satisfy them enough. Pasupare felt a world away from them now. They were talking about actual idols, not just classmates, even though Eve was still a student. She rarely had time for much outside of practice nowadays anyway, according to Kokoro. Misaki just wanted her own friends to stay the way they were for now, so they could be kids a while longer. Maybe that was selfish of her. She only wanted the best for them.

Lunch left her on an odd note, and the feeling persisted for the rest of her classes. Truthfully she’d already heard the gossip, in bits and pieces, so the full picture wasn’t exactly clear but she got the gist of it. Something about… well, it was about something romance related. Emotions Misaki wasn’t ready to touch quite yet, since she definitely had more important things to do. It wasn’t any of her business, whoever Aya was supposedly involved with, but she was popular enough that her fans were spending class guessing anyway and it was hard to ignore, depending on where you sat.

By the end of the day, Misaki still had a hazy feeling about her, as if she were trapped in some kind of mist that kept her from having a normal Monday. She couldn’t exactly pinpoint what was abnormal about it other than the looming anxiety - having real life to worry about on top of band life. When Kokoro closed her locker door for her, the haze evaporated and Misaki’s feet found stable ground again.

“Misaki!”

Misaki let her have a smile. “Are you ready to go home?”

Kokoro tilted her head and lifted her bag over her shoulder. “Actually I can’t go with you today, I came to tell you that. It’s such a shame! I look forward to seeing you after class, but I can’t stay for long this time.”

“You see me  _ in _ class. I sit in front of you. We walked out together...”

Kokoro put her hands on her hips, as if she was mocking Misaki’s obvious lapse in understanding. “I see the  _ back _ of you in class, and that isn’t the same as seeing the front. You don’t smile with the back of your head, Misaki.”

Misaki relented, allowing Kokoro the satisfaction of her misguided logic. “Of course, it’s not the same. What are you doing instead?”

Kokoro gestured to the door and they headed towards it together, weaving through students fetching their bags and coats.

“I have a business meeting!” Kokoro told her, as if what she said made any sense at all.

“A what now?” 

“A business meeting,” she repeated. “My parents have been inviting me lately. I don’t really understand, but it’s nice to go somewhere with them.”

Misaki stopped them at the door, taking a moment to unzip Kokoro’s bag. She pulled out a thick red scarf and slung it around Kokoro’s neck.

“Why do you even bring this if you’re going to forget to put it on all the time,” Misaki asked her, though it was more of an accusation. “You see me wearing mine and you still forget.”

Kokoro did little more than watch Misaki tie it up. “Well, you always do it for me, so I don’t have to remember.”

Right, of course. Misaki was an enabler if there ever was one. 

“Whatever. Come on,” she pulled Kokoro’s arm and they both stepped outside. Fall was incoming, so while it wasn’t cold it was still a bit chilly when there was a breeze. The leaves were turning too, and the schoolyard was littered with them.

“I can’t imagine you in a business meeting,” Misaki continued the conversation. “It’s hard enough to get through a Hello Happy one.”

“Ours are definitely more fun,” Kokoro nodded. “I’m not allowed to draw at the important meetings, but it’s so hard to listen when it’s all so boring. What would you do if you had to go?”

Misaki pondered the question as they approached the gates, where they would part. “I probably wouldn’t put myself in the position of having to go in the first place. Then again, I feel like that doesn’t always work out for me.”

The context was lost on Kokoro. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you do something you don’t want to do. We’re the same like that, huh?”

“Uh-huh… oh, your ride is here.”

It was hard to mistake the slick black car for anything other than Kokoro’s private chauffeur.

“Hmm,” Kokoro tapped her chin with a finger. “I’ll do my best then. Bye Misaki, see you tomorrow.”

She waved and hopped in the back, and Misaki waited there waving at her in return until she was driven off. Turning in the direction of home, she decided she should make the most of being on her own. The calm before the storm, wherein she had two siblings to look after until their parents got home late at night. She loved them to bits. Taking care of other humans was just tiring, and she did it nearly every day. 

The walk wasn’t very long, maybe twenty minutes at a brisk pace, so she opted to slow down and enjoy the fresh air while she could. Leaves crunched beneath her shoes on the sidewalk, reminiscent of the sprawling grounds at the Tsurumaki estate where she had witnessed her friends catapulting themselves into piles of leaves as high as Kaoru was tall. 

As the clouds yellowed in the soft glow of the sun above her, Misaki spotted someone she knew while walking past the park near her apartment. It was odd she’d run into Chisato, having thought about her at school earlier that day. As far as Misaki knew, she was still acting on top of doing the idol thing. It was probably best to keep walking and pretend she hadn’t seen a soul.

Well, she would have, if not for the excitable dog that came racing towards her the moment she was spotted. 

“ _ Leon _ ,” Chisato scolded, without realizing who his target was. He stopped as he hit the sidewalk, staring patiently at Misaki with soft brown eyes.

When Chisato caught up, wandering across the grass, she gave Misaki an obligatory friendly wave.

“Ah, Misaki-chan. Pardon him, he gets rambunctious when he’s off the leash.”

Misaki responded with a small smile. “It’s no problem, Shirasagi-senpai.”

“At least call me Chisato. You’re making me feel like I’m a student again,” she gathered Leon’s leash and clipped it to his collar, patting him on the head. 

“Well, it hasn’t been that long since you were.”

“I suppose you’re right. Actually, it’s a pleasant coincidence that you’re here. I was just thinking about meeting with you. It’s a very important matter.”

Chisato talking to her specifically about anything had happened almost never. Misaki was not the kind of person Chisato went to with something important to say.

“What kind of matter?” Misaki asked her, curiosity peaked. 

Chisato glanced around them, and though they were alone she gave off an air of caution. “It’s not something I really want to discuss in the middle of a park. Do you have time to sit down? There’s a lovely tea house nearby.”

The way that Chisato was talking to her made what she said sound less like a question and more like a statement about something they were going to do together regardless of what Misaki would say. Unfortunately, she really didn’t have the time at the moment.

“I have to take care of my brother and sister. If it’s important then you can text me and I’ll get back to you after I’m home.”

Chisato shook her head. “This must be done in person. It’s a shame we can’t talk right now, but maybe you can tell me when you’re free and I’ll make time.”

Misaki paused for a moment to mentally rehearse her schedule for the week. “I have some time on Wednesday, if that works for you.”

“Before your practice,” Chisato mysteriously confirmed, “that should be adequate.”

Leon laid himself down at Misaki’s feet, on the cold cement. It was tempting to lean down and pet him.

“Well, I won’t keep you. I do wonder how you’ve been though. It isn’t often I see anyone I know who isn’t a Pastel Palette.”

Misaki let out a nervous laugh. “I’m fine. At least, I think I am. I really have to go though,” she pointed in the direction of her building.

A thought caught on the tip of her tongue then. She blurted it out before she could consider that maybe it was a bad idea. “Is this about Aya-senpai?”   
  
Chisato tilted her head. “Hm? What do you mean?”

Misaki froze, realizing she’d done exactly what she had told Kokoro and Hagumi to avoid doing earlier. Sticking her nose where it didn’t belong… well, the connection had just automatically formed in her head, it wasn’t all that far-fetched. 

“It’s nothing,” Misaki shook her head. “I was just mixing up my thoughts. Not much sleep this past weekend.”

“Of course,” Chisato smiled, but even Misaki could tell it seemed a little forced. “I know that feeling. Try to get some rest tonight.”

“Yeah, I will. See you later.”

They parted awkwardly, with Chisato remaining serious and composed the entire time. They only tangentially knew each other by now, despite the both of them being good friends with Kanon and Kaoru. Misaki plodded on, doing her best to think of a reason why Chisato might have something important to talk to her about. It probably wasn’t anything bad at least, or she would have been a bit more persistent. Whatever it was, Chisato had decided it could wait a day. A chance encounter was all that had brought them together in the first place.

Her phone vibrated in her bag. She kept walking and pulled it out, swiping it open. It was a text from Kokoro, about how she wasn’t having any fun already and they’d only just started. Rarely did Kokoro actually admit that something wasn’t very fun, but Misaki couldn’t blame her in this case. Nobody could have fun in that position. She decided to be responsible anyway, instructing Kokoro to stop texting during the meeting and in exchange they could talk later. Her response was silence. She would have to prepare herself for the inevitable phone call she’d get later.

A thought occurred to Misaki as she tucked her phone away that Kaoru might be involved in this thing Chisato had to talk to her about, since that was really the only connection they had, besides Kanon who she assumed would tell her if something was up anyway. If anything was going on, there was no reason Kaoru wouldn’t have told her or the rest of their rambunctious troupe, wherein nothing could stay a secret for very long no matter how hard one tried. Secrets were always too obvious.

She was probably thinking too deeply about it for now. She was a patient person.

Kokoro sent her another text, once again proving her listening abilities were somewhat lacking. It was a photo of some doodles she was doing under the table, drawn on her own leg with a blue pen because she didn’t have any paper, Misaki guessed. The follow up message was a row of question marks, indicating that she wanted Misaki to do something about it. So much for taking a break between songs.

Her train of thought derailed as her foot came in contact with the bottom step leading up to her apartment, gracing her with a one-way ticket to the concrete. She gathered herself up quickly and looked around, hopeful that nobody had seen her trip. A larger concern was her phone screen, now cracked straight up the middle. 

_ Of course, _ she thought. 

She closed her conversation with Kokoro and dragged her feet up the stairs. One of these days she would catch a break, she just had to hold out until then.

\---

Home life was a simple affair nowadays. Her parents both worked, and a family friend dropped her brother and sister off at home every day for Misaki to mind until after dinner. They were well behaved kids, for elementary school students, so for the most part they just did their homework and watched Misaki do her chores, interrupting her from time to time for entertainment. Her childcare abilities started with cooking and ended with being moderately alright at video games, which was enough to get by.

For dinner she made a hodgepodge of leftovers, leaving the kids to their own devices and herself alone in her room so she could hop back and forth between writing a song with the leg notes and fixing her math homework. One of those things was vastly more appealing, so she set her math aside and made a mental note to text Arisa later. The silver lining of busy home life was that working hard earned her a room away from her siblings, where she could actually focus for a little while each night. 

She sat on the floor at her work table and pulled up the photo of Kokoro’s leg. There was a crudely drawn octopus and what looked like a cat holding a baseball bat, but it was hard to tell since it was distorted by the fold of Kokoro’s knee. Misaki was struck by the thought that what she was doing was absolutely ridiculous. In what world would a scenario like this ever happen? It was a rhetorical question she was asking herself, but a real question all the same. She flipped her notebook open and stared at a blank page for a solid minute.

Perhaps today wasn’t such a good day for writing after all. She still felt funny, especially about the coincidence of Chisato. It wasn’t like her to let secrets bother her, but Chisato had a secret and she wanted to know what it was. In the end she really would prefer not to know, and just keep to herself. Why did it have to be her?

She gave up after little more than ten minutes, her stray thoughts unable to leave her alone. It was already late anyway, and her parents were home so she was a free woman. She closed her notebook and her laptop, and got up to take a warm shower. She hoped it would relax her, but instead the hot water held her hostage and gave her too much time to continue thinking about everything all mixed together in her head, including what she’d thought about on the weekend and how she wanted to walk to school the same as always, about Hagumi’s hair changing and a friendly golden retriever tied to a stern blonde.

She dried her hair, changed into shorts and a tank top, and collapsed into her futon much earlier than usual. She didn’t want to do anything right now, no matter how pressing. Just as she closed her eyes, her phone started vibrating on the table.

Groaning, Misaki inched closer on the floor until she could pull the phone down. The time flashed across the screen, letting her know it was quarter to eleven, or much too late for anyone reasonable to be calling her about anything. It was Kokoro though, so reason wasn’t really relevant. 

She rested her head back on her pillow and swiped the screen.

“It’s late, Kokoro.”

“It is, isn’t it?” Kokoro sounded just as awake as she always did. “You said we could talk later, so I waited as late as I could. Do you want to hear about the business meeting?”

Well, she  _ had _ said that. “I don’t think so, but you’re probably going to tell me anyway.”

“Don’t sound so grumpy! Talking to you makes me smile, isn’t it the same for you?”

Misaki did smile a little bit, with nobody around to see her do it. “Sometimes. How was the meeting?”

“I got in trouble for asking so many questions, but I was really so confused. I tried not to ask anymore so I didn’t really know what was going on.”

“I wish I could help you, but I probably wouldn’t know either.”

“Well if anyone would know it would be you,” Kokoro told her expectantly, “I was thinking the whole time that if you were there you could explain what everyone was talking about. My dad also took away my pen.”

Misaki laughed a little. “Well, I did tell you to pay attention. It sounded like an important meeting.”

She heard Kokoro huff on the other end of the line, which always sounded a little funny because she rarely sounded so concerned. “Well if it was so important then they should answer all my questions, right? Do you know what a portfolio is?”

“Uhh, well I guess in this case it’s like… a list of accomplishments? Kind of like a resume. But not really, ugh. Like it’s stuff a company can do for other companies. I think.”

“Oh, well that makes sense. What’s a liability? My dad said his business friend has a lot of those but I don’t think they liked talking about it.”

Misaki scratched the top of her head. “I think it’s when you owe someone something. I guess… your dad’s friend probably owes him money or something.”

“I’m not very good with money. Dad says the dividends are changing and it made people angry.”

“Those two things sound related,” Misaki observed, “but I don’t think you should worry about it too much. Maybe we can go to the library and get some books about accounting or something.”

The idea already bored Misaki to death. Kokoro preferred reading about things over hearing about them, so maybe she could find what she was looking for there and turn into an accounting wiz overnight. If she didn’t like it though, Misaki couldn’t imagine she would put any effort into working her natural talent for almost everything she tried to do.

“I have some new books at home but they aren’t about accounting. Kaoru gave me a really old book with stories about princes and princesses, so I think I want to read that instead. She gave me a lot of books, actually. Has Kaoru been acting funny to you too?”

Misaki wasn’t surprised they were changing topics so quickly. It was concerning when Kokoro noticed things about their friends though, since she always paid such close attention. 

“No, but I haven’t talked to her lately outside of practice and lives. What kind of funny?”

“Ah, I’m not sure. She’s hiding again, so I think she needs help. We should investigate!”

“Hiding?”

Kokoro hummed a yes. “When she doesn’t want anyone to see her the way she sees herself. I wonder why that could be.”

That did sound like Kaoru. Maybe her hunch was right. She was more inclined to believe it, if Kokoro was thinking the same kind of thing. “I’m sure she’ll tell us eventually. We shouldn’t push her.”

“You’re right! Kaoru is our friend and she’ll ask us for help when she needs it. I’m glad I have you here, I wouldn’t know what to do.”

The back of Misaki’s neck felt warm. “Uh, well I mean I don’t really do anything you need to thank me for. I think I just say the obvious thing…”

Kokoro giggled. “Well, you’re good at doing that, it’s not so obvious to me. I think I have to get ready for bed now and I want to read first. Are you going to sleep now?”

“Yeah. I’m in bed already. I’ll try to think about your new song a bit before I fall asleep.”

“Okay! See you tomorrow.”

A click indicated Kokoro had hung up before Misaki could tell her good night. All she could do was shake her head to herself as she shoved her phone under her pillow. She did kind of feel bad that she couldn’t help with the whole business thing, so maybe she’d go to the library on her own and read up for next time. 

Kokoro was depending on her. And so was Chisato, and maybe Kaoru, and she had to keep her persistent sidekicks out of Aya’s business.

Through everything though, if she could help out even just the tiniest bit, in spite of sleep deprivation and a heaping spoonful of stress… then it was all worth it to her in the end.


	3. The Dragon of the North

The following day, the feeling Misaki had that something was off had gone away and everything returned to normal. She didn’t really know what that meant yet; normal was such an abstract concept. Yesterday had felt funny, while today was like any other day. If she were to compare it to anything else, she might consider it similar to that Saturday in the shopping district two years ago, when she first wore the bear. So much of her life had changed because Kanon had gone to throw her drums away.

Today she did not detour to Arisa’s house, and instead chose to walk to school alone in her usual early morning haze. Being alone every now and then was nice, as she liked to give herself time to prepare her tolerance levels before meeting with her friends. She wondered if Kokoro would ask her more questions, or if she’d already dumped memories of the boring meeting out of her head to clear up some space for more exciting ideas. 

When she arrived at the gates, Kokoro was there with Hagumi, chatting with Eve. Fear struck Misaki’s heart and she wondered if either of them were being nosey again. She breathed in and walked up behind them, falling into her place as the fourth wheel while confirming that they weren’t talking about anything particularly exciting. Kokoro was inviting Eve over to look at old things that sat around her house doing nothing, and now by extension Hagumi was invited as well even though she cared much less about ancient expensive dusty swords.

Misaki was already on edge, because so many unexpected things had happened only yesterday. Being unsure of anything always made her skin crawl. Discomfort wasn’t unusual, she just liked being at least a little in control of her own life. That was the hard part.

As it turned out, Misaki was left to her own devices during class for the first half of the day. That is to say, Kokoro didn’t poke her in the back every twenty minutes, and she didn’t dare turn around to provoke her into doing so. It happened every now and then that she was quiet during class depending on what she was occupied with. Thanks to whatever it was, Misaki was allowed a quick getaway during the break to meet with her acquaintances from the tennis club.

They gathered in the nearest classroom to the gym and discussed the upcoming season while Misaki debated eating her lunch then and there, or saving it until she could go find someone more familiar to sit with. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to spend time with her club, they just weren’t exactly close friends and talking about anything beyond their sport of choice was unlikely. Last time she’d tried eating with one of them, she’d just picked at her rice for forty minutes until break was over. Sometimes she wondered why she was still there, since she wasn’t a particularly good or valuable player. She liked playing, and that was about it. In the past, it was something she’d given her all towards with little return and she’d never really surpassed being average. Maybe even below average by now, even though she could use the Tsurumaki tennis courts whenever she wanted to practice.

She considered quitting right there in the room as the other girls chatted about which other schools were competing and if they could defeat Haneoka this year or not. They’d never done it once in the time Misaki had been playing, and that wasn’t likely to change. She hadn’t said anything the whole time, doing little more than sitting at one of the desks twiddling her thumbs. She didn’t really know these people, even after two and a half years. Having been ostracized for her choice in friends in a time gone by, saying nothing wasn’t all that different from how these meetings typically went. She knew her classmates didn’t feel that way anymore, but the mood stuck.

In the end she didn’t say anything, only nodding when the question of her playing again was brought up. May as well see it through until the very end, no matter how she felt about it. If she did quit, she had no doubt Kokoro and Hagumi would be rather upset considering they came to almost every single practice to obnoxiously cheer her on. She would miss that.

They were dismissed and Misaki wandered down the hallway with a still unopened lunch box. A quick peek had confirmed her classroom was empty, so she made her way to the courtyard. Students were milling about all over the place, laying in the grass or hanging about the benches, but nobody could really stand out like Kokoro did, even though she was sitting alone under a tree with a book in her lap - presumably the book she mentioned reading the night before. If anyone could snap Misaki out of an anti-social funk, it was her.

Kokoro noticed she was there only after she sat down across from her. 

“Oh, Misaki! Where have you been? I didn’t see you leave class, you just disappeared!”

_ You didn’t notice me at all today, _ was what Misaki wanted to say. 

“I had a meeting with the tennis club. Is Hagumi with her friends from track?”

Kokoro shrugged. “I dunno, I didn’t see her.”

“Hm.”

Misaki finally opened her lunch and set it on her lap, then noticed that Kokoro’s was sat beside her, untouched.

“You haven’t eaten?”

“Well, I’ve been reading instead. You didn’t eat yet either,” she pointed at Misaki’s immaculate helping of rice. “Can I have your pickles?”

“What? No! At least open yours.”

“Here’s my book,” Kokoro ignored her, holding it up to show off the cover. It was a bright shade that matched her eyes. “I found it this morning. There’s so many different stories in it, and some nice pictures.”

“One of the ones Kaoru gave you?”

She shook her head. “No, everything she gave me was Shakespeare and I don’t read very many plays. But they did remind me that I haven’t been reading anything lately, so I went to the library.” 

Misaki nibbled on the pickles Kokoro wanted to steal from her. “The one we did the show at? When did you have time to go there?”

“No no, the one in my house.”

“Right, of course.”

The library was two floors complete with endless rows of classic and modern literature, and Misaki had only seen it once when she’d got lost looking for a washroom. She knew Kaoru spent some time there, but who knew if she actually did anything productive while surrounded by seemingly endless knowledge or if she sat around reading the same playbooks over and over again.

Kokoro stuck her legs straight out and closed her book, setting it neatly on her lap. Misaki got a better look at the cover, decorated with gold filigree and falling apart at the binding. The title was in English.

“It looks well used,” Misaki gestured to the book. 

“Well, I think it’s just old. It was really dusty.”

“I don’t think I’ve seen you read anything that isn’t mostly pictures. Is this one special?”

Kokoro paused to think for a moment, then gave her a sure response. “If you think about it, every book is special to someone. Even if nobody else likes it, someone wanted to write it so it’s special to them. This is from a whole series where every book is a different color, and I thought that was interesting.”

“I guess that’s true,” Misaki nibbled on her rice again, “but what you’re basically saying is that you picked it because it’s a bright color.”

“It’s nice, isn’t it? Ah, and these are the kinds of books the suit people used to read to me when I was little.”

The thought struck Misaki that when she envisioned a child being read to, it was by their parents while they were tucked into bed and not by a stoic unrelated woman in a business suit. Not that they were emotionless or anything, the notion just felt a little… stale. She saw in her mind a very small Kokoro with very large eyes, and a suit sat next to her by the bed mechanically reciting children’s stories. 

“I assume it’s short stories then,” Misaki continued as she shoved the vision aside. “But they must be good if you’re so absorbed in them that you don’t say anything to me in class all day.”

Her words came off a little more condescending than she meant them to. Kokoro probably wouldn’t notice anyway.

Kokoro nodded. “They just get my imagination going, and then all I can do is keep reading! Do you ever enjoy something so much you can’t think of anything else when you’re doing it?”

“I guess so, but not while I’m in class.”

Kokoro picked her book back up and flipped it open to an earmarked page. “This one is about a dragon, and the king who says anyone that slays it gets to marry the princess.”

A stereotypical princess story sounded like something Kokoro would take interest in. Then again, she was interested in anything and everything or so it seemed. Misaki herself couldn’t stand the concept of traditional save-the-princess tropes. They were all the same drivel, and it was hard for her to imagine anyone older than ten becoming enthralled with them at all.

“Well, I’m glad you’re enjoying it,” she tried to bring the topic to a close.

“I am! There’s a magical ring that does all kinds of things, and the boy steals it from the witch. He gets to marry the princess after of course, it’s kind of a happy ending, but only at the very end.”

Misaki popped open her water bottle. “I don’t really like those kinds of stories. Doesn’t it bother you that you always know what’s going to happen? The knight slays the dragon and marries the princess and they all live happily ever after. It gets repetitive.”

Kokoro’s hand picked at the grass. “You can still enjoy it even if you know what happens. When I was little, these were my favourite kinds of stories because I always liked to imagine the happy endings. It made me smile to think about the prince and the princess being happy forever, even if it was really hard for them to get there.”

“Knowing you also like Rimi’s favourite horror manga makes me question your taste.”

Kokoro laughed at her. “They’re really not anything alike, are they? Zombie stories are fun too but for different reasons.”

“Yeah. Fun…”

Watching  _ Dawn of the Dead _ on Rimi’s couch was not a fond memory of hers. She could call it a classic all she wanted, that didn’t make it any less terrifying. Horror was not her genre of choice.

“I like these ones because they remind me of those feelings I had when I was very small. I think back then, everything made me happy in a different way than now. Do you ever feel like that?”

She put her book down again and snapped up the last pickle in Misaki’s lunch with her bare hands. Scolding her would accomplish nothing, so Misaki let lost pickles lie.

“Probably, but I don’t really think about it. I don’t remember what my parents read to me, but I did read to my siblings. Not so much anymore since I’m so busy.”

Kokoro gave her a smile. “Well, when I was their age I think it meant a lot to me. I could imagine what I wanted to happen when I got older, and even though I knew they were just stories, I still believed I could do whatever I dreamed of.”

In a way, Misaki supposed she was doing all of that now. It certainly seemed that way, and a majority of the time it was Misaki herself doing the work to bring her dreams to life. Strange parallels indeed.

Misaki leaned back on her hands. “Well, are you following your dreams now?”

“Not the ones I had back then, those were really different. I think they were kind of silly even though I really wanted them to come true.”

“Hm, well, I always figured you wanted to do the everyone smile thing.”

She often forgot she’d only known Kokoro for a few years. Anything she’d been before they met was a mystery, or a collection of extremely vague moments pieced together by discovering what Kokoro had never done that normal kids might have.

Kokoro laughed again. “That’s what we’re doing now, isn’t it? But a long time ago, I wanted a handsome knight to come and save me, just like in the stories. Since almost every ending was a happy one, that’s what I thought would happen to me too.”

“You wanted a  _ what _ now?”

“I know! But that’s what I dreamed about. I thought about a big white horse and someone in nice silver armor, and they would come sweep me up and give me everything I wanted.”

Misaki felt like her brain was working overtime trying to imagine Kokoro needing to be saved by anyone, much less a literal knight in shining armor. What would she ever need saving from anyway? A dragon? She was more likely to make friends with one than have anyone kill it. Sure, she was a bit of a princess, especially in the fantastical get-everything-you-ever-wanted sense. Didn’t she already have everything she wanted? Why did some nobody with a bucket on his head need to give it to her? Who was this guy anyway?

It was normal, Misaki supposed, for a young girl to wish for a handsome man to come and sweep her off her feet. She’d even had dreams about it herself, but she attributed that to puberty and not because she was out deliberately looking for a boyfriend, as if she would have time for that anyway. And it always took place in the moment, or in the future, and not in literal medieval times. What were they talking about again?

“Misaki?”

“Huh?” She snapped out of her pseudo-daydream.

“Are you still listening?”

Misaki nodded vigorously, as if to shake her train of thought loose from its tracks. 

“Yes yes, I hear you. So that’s the kind of thing you dreamt about, huh?”

“Yeah, it sure was a long time ago. I used to draw my dreams too, but I don’t know where all the drawings went.”

“Do… you still dream about that kind of thing now, too? Or even think about it?”

Misaki wasn’t quite sure what prompted her to ask the question. In the end, the things Kokoro had dreams about didn’t really mean anything. At most they might contribute to a song every now and then, but maybe these thoughts were too personal to belt out in front of a live audience.

Kokoro stared at Misaki and picked at her skirt, clearly giving her reply a good thinking over. It scared Misaki, when Kokoro had to stop and think before talking about something. 

“Well, lately my parents have been talking about how much I’ve grown up. They said I’m almost done with high school and then I’ll have to make all kinds of big choices. It’s not the kind of thing I like to talk about so I don’t really remember everything.”

If nothing else, Misaki could rest knowing she wasn’t the only one who had to think about what she was going to do next. She was curious though, what was Kokoro meant to do? Not that she was about to push her luck then and there.

“It seems like something you should pay attention to.”

“Maybe,” Kokoro replied, “but all that was on my mind was thinking about what I wanted to be when I grew up. You know, when I was a kid. Everything was a lot more fun back then.”

“Oh, so Hello Happy isn’t fun enough for you?” Misaki jested, making sure Kokoro could see her smiling.

Kokoro giggled in turn. “Of course it is! It’s the most fun I’ve ever had. I think Kanon and Kaoru will have important things to do though, so we can’t be Hello Happy forever.”

Misaki’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “You’ve come to terms with that a lot quicker than I expected. I figured you’d be upset.”

“Well, someone once told me that when one door closes, another door opens.”

“Who was that?”

Kokoro looked away at her lunch for a second, swapping her book for her bento as she spoke. “Kaoru, when Chisato told her to go away last weekend.”

“Ah. I feel bad for Kaoru sometimes.”

“Really?” Kokoro popped the top off her bento. “I always admired their friendship. Anyway, I think what Kaoru means is that there’s always somewhere to go. If we can’t always make everyone smile with our band, then we have to come up with something new. Even if we have to do it on our own.”

No wonder Kanon considered Kokoro to be a hero. She definitely spoke like one sometimes, regardless of whether or not she believed herself. Sometimes she was a little suffocating, with all of the good she wanted to do and the joy she wanted to spread. If she ever wanted anything for herself, nobody would know.

“You’re very optimistic,” was what Misaki settled on telling her. “Not everyone will have the chance to do that kind of thing later.”

“We’ll work on it,” Kokoro told her before digging into her meal. Misaki followed suit.

It was the longest conversation they’d had in a while that wasn’t about anything music related, and it was these that Misaki treasured most. She loved everything about their band (but would certainly never admit it), and in the end, should they ever part ways, what she wanted to remember the most was who they were as individuals. They were her friends, not just her bandmates.

If anything, she wished she could stay as ignorant about the future as Kokoro was now, lost in her thoughts of early childhood and revisiting her favourite stories as if she had what would come next all figured out. For now they were just two teenagers sitting in the grass at school, with a math class on the immediate horizon. 

It struck Misaki that she wouldn’t mind if time froze right then, or if she could rewind at the end of the day and wake up on the same morning, greet her friends the same way, and sit by herself at her desk thinking about life again. Maybe it would get boring or old, and her friends would never know about it. But at least they would still be together.

\---

After school, Misaki ran home with Kokoro on her heels so they could swap clothes before band practice. Hagumi had a meeting with the dance club so they had at least an hour, but as usual they had to pick her back up on the way so they could all walk together.

Lately Misaki had been practicing as herself instead of her fuzzy alter-ego, and their uniforms weren’t exactly the most comfortable thing. Or maybe they were alright, and Misaki was just used to wearing sweatshirts and shorts. Either way, she felt better about playing music if she was comfy. Kokoro probably didn’t care, but she liked to be included in things her friends did, and in Misaki’s case, things her friends wore. They were never actually inside Misaki’s house for more than ten minutes, maybe fifteen if they stopped to grab a snack, but it was enough time for her to raid Misaki’s closet for a hoodie and some sweatpants. She would bring them back. One day.

On their way back to the school, Misaki received a text from Kaoru with a long winded apology and a flowery explanation of why she would be late that could barely be parsed. She spoke like she was reciting lines from a play constantly, but her typing was even worse. Typing gave her time to look up synonyms in the dictionary.

“Kaoru’s gonna be late,” Misaki flashed her phone screen in Kokoro’s direction as they walked down the street. “Should we let everyone know practice is delayed a little?”

“Is it at the studio or my house today?” Kokoro asked, genuinely unsure of where they were even going.

“I booked the studio today. We can wait for her, but I don’t think we can extend our booking. Afterglow is scheduled right after us.”

“Oh, well that’s alright. We can start without her if she’s okay with it!”

Misaki said nothing, firing off the question to Kaoru. Five long minutes later, she received an elaborate, detailed response that said little more than “yes”.

“We should really teach Kaoru to text more efficiently.”

Kokoro shrugged, still smiling.

Hagumi was waiting outside the gates for them, still in her uniform. Together they made their way to CiRCLE, with one more stop at the train station to pick up Kanon and prevent her from wandering off in the wrong direction. With her hair down she looked much older, definitely not like she belonged in a band with some local highschoolers. 

Misaki checked them in for their time slot, and then as usual everyone else discussed anything but playing instruments while she did an equipment check. Kanon often told her that she felt bad Misaki was the one left to such tasks, but really it was a lot easier if Kanon distracted the three dummies instead of plugging in amps or replacing the strings on Hagumi’s base. Kaoru’s absence let Misaki finish a little faster than usual.

“So what are we doing today?” Misaki asked, just as Kaoru burst through the door with all of her well-practiced charm and grace.

“I have arrived,” Kaoru declared, sweeping her arm into her faithful pose.

Misaki sighed, already sensing an incoming headache.

“Oh, you made it!” Kokoro shouted at her, leaping to her feet from her spot on the floor.

“What was the point of your text then?” Misaki couldn’t help but question her.

“The tides have turned,” Kaoru declared, “alas, some plans are not meant to be. Perhaps it is destiny that finds me here on time.”

“Incredible non-answer,” Misaki droned, glancing at Kanon.

Kanon giggled under her breath. “Well, we’re glad you’re here in any case.”

“Kao-kun!” Hagumi shouted, launching herself at Kaoru with her arms wide. Misaki snagged the back of her uniform as she flew past.

“Okay okay, we’re all glad Kaoru made it. We should get started though, we only have an hour today.”

Hagumi sulked a little, but happily retreated to her bass with Kaoru’s promise of a post-practice hug. 

Kokoro made her switch from tag-along to band leader in the blink of an eye, making up a setlist on the spot of songs she probably just felt like singing, but really they didn’t have anything specific they needed to play at the moment. They were still between gigs, so it wasn’t all that relevant. Staying in practice was the primary goal, whenever Kanon and Kaoru were both free at the same time.

Even if she didn’t act like it all the time, Kokoro was definitely a born leader. When she said it, they played it, and Misaki took mental notes as they went about what could be improved upon even if she didn’t know why they would need to improve to begin with. It helped to have some kind of goal in mind, even if it was as simple as perfecting songs she sang in her head every single day.

Kokoro needed to work on keeping her voice steady while she was bouncing around the stage like a ping pong ball. Kanon didn’t need much work, her confidence kept her steady and strong in her playing. Hagumi needed to stop trying to follow Kokoro into cartwheels with a bass in her arms. Kaoru… well, something sounded particularly off about Kaoru’s playing today. She was a quarter of a note too quick, something that nobody but Misaki would notice. It was surprisingly rare that Kaoru made any kind of mistake. Her perfect playing went hand-in-hand with her princely persona, after all.

They took a short break at the half-hour mark, Misaki keeping her eye on Kaoru, who was reciting something between sips from a water bottle. She did like to drift about, that was normal. Hagumi was sitting on the floor sharing croquettes with Kanon.

“ _ Has Kaoru been acting funny to you too? _ ”

That was what Kokoro had said to her yesterday. She wasn’t acting funny, though, just like herself with a little more disorganization. It was likely Misaki was reading into it a little too closely. Kaoru was often vague and cryptic without even meaning to be, after all, so she could hardly imagine her doing it intentionally to avoid something.

But again, maybe Kokoro was still right. She usually was. How in the world was she supposed to confront Kaoru about it though? Tell her Kokoro had some kind of mystical feeling about her and to please explain what’s going on? There was no polite way to go about it and Kaoru could always just brush her off.

“You’re watching her too?” Kokoro came up behind her, still sitting at her turntables.

“No,” Misaki told her, sipping at her own water.

“So you noticed as well, right?”

“Depends what you think I noticed.”

She turned to look at Kokoro, but she was still looking intently at Kaoru, who was waltzing around the studio with herself. The smile on her face made her thoughts impossible to discern. If she was concerned, nobody would ever know unless she told them.

“Well, I guess it doesn’t matter what you noticed. Just that there was something to notice. Do you think Kaoru is happy?”

“She looks happy to me. Do you think she isn’t?”

“Can you ask her about it for me?” Kokoro brushed off the question. “I wouldn’t want her to feel sad.”

Misaki leaned back in her chair, slouched. “Why don’t  _ you _ ask her? You’re the leader.”

Kokoro hummed. “I could, but you always know what to do. So I think it’s better if you do it.”

If she didn’t say anything, Kokoro would probably interpret her silence as compliance. It wasn’t like she thought she wouldn’t have to be the one to ask anyway, so she remained quiet. Kokoro, probably bored of her, skipped away in the direction of Hagumi and Kanon. She’d noticed something was fishy long before the thought had ever crossed Misaki’s mind. She was always right. The whole thing was stressful.

When they returned to practice, Kaoru remained just as off as she had before the break. Nothing else about her betrayed anything she might be feeling outwardly. Kaoru’s method was playing from the heart. If she had to concentrate, then her mind was elsewhere.

When they were done, Kanon helped Misaki clean up like usual and she didn’t say anything about the topic of interest, meaning she probably had no suspicions. It would be nice to talk to someone who wasn’t Kokoro about it. Hagumi’s packed schedule had her heading to a softball game afterward, and Kaoru said something about needing to be on her way, because of course she did. If she left now, Misaki might not get to talk to her in person for a week or longer. A text certainly wouldn’t cut it.

Kokoro was beside her again, taking the extension cord from her hands. 

“I’ll help Kanon clean up so you can go home early today, alright Misaki?”

“Ah, thank you Kokoro,” Kanon chimed in, innocent to Kokoro’s intent. “I think Misaki-chan deserves the extra rest today.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Misaki scratched the nape of her neck. “I’m going then. Bring those back tonight.” She gestured at Kokoro’s stolen ensemble, to no reply.

She slipped out the door after Kaoru, barely enough time to grab her bag. She didn’t want to come off as too suspicious, if Kaoru would even pick up on it.

“Which way are you going?” A safe way to open the conversation.

“Ah, my dear Misaki-chan. You wish to accompany me?”

Misaki kept her eyes forward as they walked down the sidewalk together. “I don’t see why not.”

Kaoru chuckled to herself for some reason. “I see! Well in such a case, you are welcome at my side. I’m heading to… to the train station,” she stuttered.

“The station. Right, that’s fine, I have to stop at the store over that way.”

She didn’t really need to, but if she popped in and bought ice cream for her siblings then she wouldn’t be lying.

“The stars have aligned, then,” Kaoru sang. “Tell me then, how have you been as of late?”

Misaki stuck her hands in her hoodie pocket. “Same as usual, nothing really changes with me. Also, we just saw each other a few days ago…”

“Of course. But to friends as close as us, a few days can seem an eternity. Oh, to be away from me for so long…”

“I take it that means you’ve been doing good too,” Misaki brushed off her meaningless comment. “Nothing too exciting going on?”

Kaoru hesitated for maybe half a second, faltering in her steps. “Exciting? No, no, nothing all too exciting. The highlight of my life as of late has, of course, been our extraordinary performances. Little else comes to mind.”

Misaki’s eyes trailed downward and she watched the cracks in the sidewalk pass them by. She wasn’t cut out for this kind of thing. She was blunt and straightforward, not some kind of smooth-talker that could worm anything out of the likes of Kaoru. So then, maybe she should just be herself and jump straight to the point.

“Your playing was off today,” she blurted out. “I don’t want to bother you about it, I just noticed so I wanted to make sure you’re doing alright.”

Kaoru stopped walking right before they reached the street corner, Misaki stopping alongside her. She hesitated, eyes darting from Misaki to the pavement and princely smile gone from her face. Something was up, one-hundred percent confirmed.

“My dear Misaki… I assure you there is nothing for you to concern yourself with this fine day. Happy as it is, like every other, there is nothing I would wish to say to you that might change that happiness.”

Of course that would be her answer.

Misaki sighed. “Well, when you say something like that, it’s not exactly convincing.”

Kaoru laughed and ran a hand through her hair, adjusting her posture and slipping back into her persona with practiced ease.

“How perceptive you are, surely it isn’t coincidence. In truth, do you not believe that all that is meant to be revealed will be revealed when the time is right? You cannot rush fate, just as you cannot persuade an actor from an act she intends to keep,” Kaoru began walking again, Misaki trailing beside her.

“Well, Romeo, I wasn’t the first person to notice. If there’s something you’re not telling me then maybe you should brush up on your act,” Misaki said, with no intention other than warning her that she might be coming across as a little obvious to people she wasn’t meant to be obvious to. Kokoro was usually an exception, but better to be safe than sorry.

“Well noted, I assure you,” Kaoru nodded, elegant smile returned. “I thank you for your concern, truly. For now I must be off, and I believe you have shopping to do.”

They’d arrived and Misaki hadn’t even noticed, though it wasn’t like she was ever intending to go that way to begin with. 

“Alright. Just take care of yourself.”

“And you as well, my dear Misaki.”

Kaoru gave her a quick bow and headed for the station gates while Misaki milled around until she was out of site. She didn’t really know what she expected from that conversation. It turned into what she thought it would by the end, and she had learned exactly nothing. She wasn’t sure what she should tell Kokoro, or if she even should at all. Part of what Kaoru said was true. If she was meant to know, then she would know. She had to trust the judgement of her friend and wait.

She turned in the direction of home, breathed out slowly to clear her head, and pulled out her phone to remind Kokoro about her clothes.

Her deeper worries were for another day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "The Dragon of the North" is a story gathered in The Yellow Fairy Book.


	4. A Costly Favour

Kokoro, fully absorbed in her book of stories once again, had left Misaki alone for the second day in a row. A long time ago that might have been nice, because past Misaki would have given anything for a quiet morning. At least Kokoro was paying full attention to something for once. Maybe she was the smart one, losing herself in the novel so she wouldn’t have to ponder on the Kaoru situation while Misaki was left to solve it on her own. A distraction would be nice, but hiding her felting supplies behind a textbook would be a bit more difficult than hiding another book - that’s what Kokoro was doing, sneaking words between lessons. 

They still ate lunch together again, along with Hagumi who came and went as she pleased. Misaki often wondered if the popular sports-playing highschool student stereotype had any kind of base in reality, since it seemed to define Hagumi pretty thoroughly. Maybe tennis didn’t really count, or the number of friends you made was based on how good you were. Moderate didn’t cut it these days. Hagumi was popular, in the same way Kokoro was popular for being a complete weirdo. She had croquettes to share with them, as she always did.

What put Misaki off was that she didn’t mention anything from yesterday while Hagumi was there. It was mostly the story thing; it seemed her little yellow book stole her attention away from Misaki, but not from Hagumi. Far be it from Misaki to admit jealousy, not because she didn’t ever feel that way, but because it was dumb to be jealous when your friend talked to your other friend. They were together all the time, so who Kokoro talked to didn’t matter. If she wanted to talk to her book instead, that was well within her rights. It was stupid to be jealous of a book. Was it possible to care about her friends too much? What else did she have, anyway.

In retrospect, she was probably missing that tiny connection she had with Kokoro whenever something abnormal was going on, or when they had to put together a show. Those moments when Kokoro came to her and so clearly depended on her to solve something, they were especially important in that they made Misaki feel wanted and useful, something she still struggled with even though she felt like she definitely belonged in her circus already. Having purpose meant more to her than usual as of late. At the same time, Kokoro was always too ready to move on. Misaki told herself every time; it wasn’t personal, Kokoro simply wasn’t the kind of person to dwell on her problems. If something needed doing, she asked Misaki for help, and then she skipped off to find something to entertain herself with while the problem got solved. 

And so now, she’d told Misaki her feelings about her book, and about Kaoru acting funny. Now she was back to her book and whatever it was she was talking to Hagumi about, while Misaki had to do enough thinking for both of them. Kokoro was just tiring sometimes, without meaning to come off as troublesome. 

Even though they didn’t really trade words between them while Hagumi was there, Kokoro’s smile was enough to keep Misaki rooted. Seeing her happy in spite of the mysteries surrounding the local prince kept her firmly in place, and her happiness was contagious even if the origin of it remained unknown.

At the end of the day, she walked together with Kokoro to the locker room.

“We can’t walk home together today,” Misaki explained to her. “I have something important to do - and no, you can’t come with me to the important thing.”

Kokoro was standing right behind her as she emptied her locker into her bag. 

“What kind of important thing is it? Can I help?”

Misaki closed the locker door and spun around. “It’s nothing you have to worry about, you can leave it to me.”

Thankfully, Kokoro was easy to satisfy with some reassurance. 

“Okay, well, you can do your important thing and I’ll go window shopping until you’re done. That way we can still walk home together, alright?”

Misaki sighed and rubbed the back of her neck. “Um, well, I guess so. That wasn’t really the problem but if you want to then I guess we can meet up later.”

They slung their bags over their shoulders at the same time, heading for the door to the front gates. 

“I forgot my wallet,” Kokoro pointed out to herself.

“You always forget your wallet,” Misaki rolled her eyes. “Do you want change for ice cream or something? I don’t think I’ll be very long.”

Kokoro jumped at that, pumping her fist. “Yes please! That sounds wonderful, you have the best ideas!”

“Alright, alright,” Misaki pulled her wallet out of her bag as they walked, feeling around inside for her last remaining five hundred yen coins. “Do your window shopping and I’ll meet you at the ice cream place after.”

She handed her money to Kokoro, who continued skipping off at a brisk pace in the opposite direction from Hazawa Coffee, where Misaki had agreed to meet with one Shirasagi Chisato about… well, she had no idea what it was about. She just knew that Kokoro wasn’t supposed to be there, and she wasn’t sure how to tell her she wasn’t allowed to come. 

Of course, Kokoro had run off too early. She pulled her phone out and texted her that she would let her know when she was done and on her way, and to get her a scoop of vanilla with no toppings and no fancy cones or whatever it was Kokoro always tried to convince her was tastier. 

She flicked over to her conversation with Chisato, who had simply sent her a time and location. Chisato had given her exactly enough time to walk from school to downtown, punctual as anyone might imagine she would be. She set out, and for reasons unknown she felt as though her heart was about to beat itself out of her chest. There was just something off about this whole  _ thing _ , and she didn’t want to tell herself that this  _ thing _ with Chisato and this  _ other _ thing with Kaoru were connected, but she knew they were. She just knew it, and she knew that whatever it was, it would mean trouble for her. Secrets never lent themselves to anything less than trouble.

Her phone vibrated in her hand. A text from Chisato requesting a change of location, new address included. She looked it up and learned it wouldn’t be far from where she lived. Did Chisato live nearby? It would make sense, considering their run-in at the park. The address was definitely residential. 

Misaki: why not hazawa’s?

Chisato: Last minute change of plans.

Misaki: is this your house

Chisato: Apartment complex. I’ll meet you at the gate.

A gated apartment? Well, she didn’t really know much about Chisato’s personal life to begin with.

Chisato’s apartment was only a couple blocks past Misaki’s own; it was one of those places she could walk past and know that people who had money lived there. Sleek, very clean, security guard at the entrance, the whole shebang. She knew she would feel stupid later, for walking past her apartment, and then back to collect Kokoro so they could walk back to her own apartment again. 

Chisato was there, dressed in her pastels and looking the picture of perfection just in front of the shiny black gate. 

“Sorry for the last minute change. Some things just can’t be avoided.”

Misaki shook her head. “It’s fine, I live close anyway.”

She watched Chisato enter a code into a keypad and followed her through the gate, unsure about what to say as they stepped inside. Chisato guided her to the elevator and they waited for it together in silence while Misaki looked back and forth between the floor and her own shoes. Misaki stole a glance at Chisato, who she looked like she was concentrating very hard on expressing no emotion beyond her plain smile. Maybe she was acting, like Kaoru did, only a lot better. The elevator came at last. She was glad for it, because the lobby smelled irritably like flowers.

The silence was broken after Chisato pushed the button for the tenth floor.

“I really do appreciate this. I know it was rather out of the blue.”

“No no, it’s really fine. I’m sure you’re busy so it’s fine to meet here.”

Chisato’s slight smile faded. “It has nothing to do with how busy I am. If it was only you and I, then we would be ordering fresh coffee right now.”

Misaki blinked at her. “Who else is here?”

“Our favourite guitarist. Yesterday put her on edge. Well, both of us.”

“So this has something to do with Kaoru… I mean, we were worried about her but… it’s not anything bad is it?”

Misaki had no idea what “anything bad” entailed, even though she was the one who said it. She ran a hand through her hair and noticed her palm was sweaty.

“It depends on your perspective,” Chisato offered as the elevator doors opened. “But Kaoru trusts you and I don’t think we have much of a choice in this situation.”

Biting her lip, she followed Chisato out of the elevator and down the hall. She was let into a decent sized, modern apartment, reminding herself that Chisato was a professional idol among other things that made considerable money when done right. It was plain and elegant, with little around to suggest anyone extraordinary lived there. And then there was Kaoru, sitting awkwardly on the couch with an untouched cup of water in front of her on the table.

“Tea?” Chisato offered.

“No, I’m fine.”

Misaki slipped her shoes off and noted the silence that greeted her over her flamboyant friend. 

“Kaoru-san,” Misaki nodded. “It’s been a whole day. Not going to serenade me?”

Chisato gestured to an armchair. “I don’t think she’s in the mood today.”

Her tone implied that she herself had set the scene and Kaoru had been instructed into silence. And she looked… nervous. Misaki had seen this face a rare few times, all of which had involved Chisato calling her out for something or another. At the moment, Kaoru had trouble meeting her eyes.

Misaki took a seat and wished she’d brought Kokoro along. Anything to lighten the mood, even if it betrayed her character. Chisato chose to remain standing.

“So what’s this all-”

“It’s best not to beat around any bushes,” Chisato interrupted her, “Okusawa-san, you’re far from being the most responsible person in your band, but proximity leaves us little option.”

Misaki’s fist gripped the armrest. “Wait, what?”

“You’re a realist like I am, so I hope you’ll take this seriously. There’s a reason I’m pointing out your irresponsibility, which I assure you isn’t an attack on your person at all.”

“I’m not sure what makes you think I’m irresponsible. I mean, that’s not the best opener if you need my help with something,” Misaki bit her tongue, itching to come up with a biting retort. She didn’t like to imagine herself being rude to anyone, but sometimes the situation called for it.

Chisato gazed down at her, expressionless. “If you weren’t, then perhaps you wouldn’t bend over backwards for Tsurumaki-san. Some might call it enabling.”

“I call it being productive. I work with what I’m given.”

“Very admirable. But this time, your relationship with her comes second. It seems, by your own words, that Kaoru has been noticed. Was it Hagumi-chan?”

Misaki glanced at Kaoru, who was looking sheepish.

“Well, no. It was Kokoro. Actually - you know, I’m really confused and I have somewhere to be.”

“We need your help,” Chisato told her firmly. “I’m sure I don’t sound particularly inviting right now, but this is serious. So I’m being as serious as is necessary.”

“Misaki-chan,” Kaoru spoke up at last, “my apologies for any slights upon you, matters of the heart are delicate and perhaps we are not at our best…”

“Matters of the heart?”

“Kaoru and I are in a romantic relationship, and we need your assistance in covering it up.”

Misaki swore her heart skipped a beat at that. Sure, she’d always known Kaoru to be a big flirt, but at the same time, something inside of her brain told her that she was never serious. It told her that, despite being so completely forward and obvious, Kaoru was playing up her persona and was not genuinely interested in women, because she just… well, it was just something Misaki had never  _ actually _ thought about. And why would she? Kaoru’s business was none of hers.

Thirty seconds ago, that had changed.

“I...I mean, I don’t really follow…”

Chisato regarded her calmly. “You look a little pale. Are you sure you don’t want some tea?”

Kaoru was looking at something in the corner, completely red in the face.

“Coffee,” Misaki relented. “Black is fine.”

Chisato wandered into her kitchen, completely unaffected for all Misaki could tell. What in the world was she supposed to do about this? She shouldn’t be involved to begin with.  _ Why _ her? Romance - and really anything related to it - made Misaki uncomfortable. She told herself she didn’t know why, and she also told herself that it was something for future Misaki, when she was older and knew everything about being an adult.

When Chisato came back, she handed Misaki a hot mug and sat down on the couch next to Kaoru, who at least wasn’t fixated on the corner of the room anymore.

“Truly,” she spoke up, “we are sorry Misaki-chan, but the red string of fate has -”

“Yes, I get it,” Misaki told her sternly. “I heard Shirasagi-san.”

Her voice came out colder than she was expecting.

Chisato tilted her head. “You look shaken up. Is it really so surprising to you? Or maybe you’re not as agreeable as we thought.”

“No, no,” the words rushed from Misaki’s lips, “It’s just, I wasn’t really expecting it. I don’t think about this stuff. I guess it just isn’t something I considered. I definitely didn’t expect you to ask me… that.”

“It is what it is. If you’d be so kind as to listen, I’m sure I can fill in some of the glaring holes for you.”

All Misaki could do was nod, her fingers rubbing the handle of the hot mug carefully. Inside her chest, her heart was still pounding away. She shouldn’t be involved. She didn’t want to think about it.

“As I’m sure you’re aware, Kaoru hasn’t gone to university yet as you and your friends probably assumed she would. You were under the impression that she chose not to attend in order to continue her musical career.”

Kaoru laughed quietly to herself, a sure sign of her nervousness. “Ah, Chi-chan, you make it sound as though I withheld the truth on purpose.”

“You  _ did _ ,” Chisato emphasized, “but you didn’t lie. You did what we felt was right at the time.”

“You were accepted, weren’t you?” Misaki added two and two together. “To Osaka University?”

Kaoru nodded solemnly. “A wonderful opportunity it was, with regrettable timing. Such is the way the petals fall from the flower.”

“She made the decision to stay with me when I… relented. Maybe it was selfish of me to ask so much.”

“As I have said many a time, your love was not an act of selfishness,” Kaoru lightly grazed Chisato’s knee with her hand. “Forgoing my wants for  _ ours _ was no mistake.”

But Chisato didn’t smile. 

“And yet, here we are,” she said, “asking for help where it shouldn’t be needed.”

“I still don’t exactly understand what I’m helping you to do,” Misaki pointed out. “And why it has to be me.”

“In some ways, I suppose it’s complicated to think about,” Chisato began again. “But in the simplest terms, I’ll admit that we aren’t as good at hiding this as we thought we would be. I’m in a position that doesn’t allow me to even consider a relationship with a man, much less another woman. The next four years will be the peak of my career, and we’re slipping up before it’s even started.”

“Is it in your contract or something? You can’t date people?”

Chisato nodded. “I signed away my rights to a normal life years ago, and so did the rest of Pastel Palettes. It’s not often that contracts will stop idols from doing what they aren’t supposed to do. If nobody finds out, then it never happened.”

Misaki looked into her cup.

“So where do I come in, then?”

Chisato stole Kaoru’s glass for a moment before continuing. “As we summarized already, your friends are noticing. Really, it doesn’t matter who it is.”

“Kokoro is more perceptive than you would guess. It’s always going to be her,” Misaki clarified.

“Right,” Chisato went on, “well, yesterday Kaoru made the interesting decision to come to my studio after hours expecting to be let in.”

Kaoru again turned red. “Ah, a misstep on my part. I simply had to see you, after hearing news of your recent role.”

Misaki could practically feel the tension between her companions, this was obviously something they hadn’t resolved yet.

“Of course,” Chisato stared into Misaki’s eyes, “I had intended to tell you about this anyway. I did not let Kaoru in to see me and had her escorted away by Aya, luckily the only other person in the studio at the time.”

“That explains Kaoru-san’s strange texts about being late for practice.”

“Yes, she argued with me for a little while,” Chisato gave Kaoru a look. Her counterpart, though uncomfortable, still smiled at her.

Chisato’s gaze softened. “I appreciate her dedication… but she never should have told you anything. From what Kaoru told me, it only served to encourage a certain someone’s curiosity.”

Misaki nodded. “Kokoro was the one who asked me to talk to Kaoru after practice.”

Kaoru stood then, and made her way over to the kitchen to busy herself making her own tea.

“As you can imagine, Kaoru would very much like to tell your friends about us. And I’m sure they would love to hear about it. They’re also very loud, and tend not to think before they act. Perhaps they wouldn’t understand the stakes.”

“You want me to keep them from finding out,” Misaki concluded. 

For a moment, there was something in Chisato’s eyes, maybe a flash of regret. Misaki had seen it in her mirror before. “They can’t know. Not until we’re safe. Kaoru can’t even tell her parents. We aren’t sure how they’ll react, and I certainly could never tell mine. The people we know are our only options.”

Misaki’s stomach was churning. Things like this; things with consequences and unfortunate implications did not happen to her. They happened to other people. Silly things happened to her. This was not a silly thing, and she wished it was. 

“And it’s been a year?” Misaki asked. “You’ve been together for a year?”

“Give or take,” Chisato tilted her head. Kaoru was standing in the kitchen, staring into her mug.

“I just feel like you should have asked someone else. I don’t understand why Kanon isn’t sitting here right now. She’s your best friend.”

“Of course she knows. She knew from the beginning.”

Misaki felt her eyes widen. That was something she hadn’t expected. Nothing Kanon had ever said or did even came close to giving her away, and she thought they shared most of their personal lives with each other. She never would have guessed. Never.

“I didn’t notice anything,” was all she could say.

“Exactly,” Chisato said. “Kanon is confident. She can keep a secret. But she can’t lie, and she has a hard time saying no.”

“I see.”

So, Chisato and Kaoru needed her to keep Hagumi and Kokoro, two of Kaoru’s closest friends, from finding out about her secret relationship, because if they did know then they might slip up or misunderstand that it’s a bad thing for anyone else to know - and really, if anyone  _ did _ find out when they weren’t supposed to, then, well… Misaki didn’t exactly want to imagine the possibilities. She wanted her friends to be happy. If they couldn’t trust even their own families, then of course friends were the only option. Perhaps they should never have told even Kanon.

“Do you think you should have waited? To do all of this, I mean?” Misaki found herself asking. Common sense told her that if this idea was truly as bad as they were making it out to be, then they should have simply not gone through with it. Not now, anyway. 

“I’m sure that sounds reasonable to you, but you can’t understand the position we’re in. The fact is that we’ve already made the choice, and now we have to deal with what we have. Like I said, we aren’t as good at hiding it as we thought we would be. And Kaoru, she’s a different kind of actor. If I lied to you, you would never know.”

Misaki sipped her coffee. “That’s comforting.”

“It’s a useful skill,” Chisato let a small smile slip through. “But the reality is that together, we aren’t that good. I know I called you irresponsible, but that’s something you can change. We’ve already done ourselves in. Talking to you about this is part of accepting that we might have made a mistake.”

“It’s weird to think of this as being some kind of mistake. I feel like I’m supposed to be happy for you,” Misaki ran a hand through her hair. “Do you get what I mean?”

Chisato nodded. “I think I do. And really, we don’t know if this was a mistake or not. Maybe it would have been a mistake for us to stay separated for five more years. We’ll never know.”

Misaki sighed. “Well, has it been worth it so far?”

Chisato turned her gaze to Kaoru, who finally looked away from her cup. She was still smiling, that subtle, charming smile that Kaoru was chasing all the time. Kaoru was smiling too, beneath her fading blush.

“I would say so. It’s been complicated, but when you care this much for someone else, you make it work. Even if you know your choices aren’t exactly rational. Love doesn’t seem to care what you think is right or wrong. We’ve already forgone our responsibility, and now we’re forced to place it in the hands of others,” Chisato turned back to Misaki.

“Who knows? Maybe we’ll have our regrets later. Maybe it’s selfish for me to have none right now, while I sit here and ask you to lie to your friends.”

Misaki breathed in. It was a lot to take in, and she wasn’t sure if they’d made the right choice in asking her to do this. In the end, she supposed there wasn’t really anyone else. She was good at keeping Kokoro and Hagumi out of other people’s business, so this shouldn’t be any different. She just had to do what she always did, and give them a hard no if they ever pried too much. Hopefully Kaoru would smarten up a little on top of that.

An obvious thought crossed her mind, one she knew she needed to voice.

“What about your Kokoro?”

Chisato looked confused for a moment, and then nodded in understanding. “Hina has her own problems to deal with right now. What I’m up to will likely never cross her mind. If it does, then I’ll deal with it.”

_ Are you sure? _ Misaki wanted to ask, wondering what Sayo might look like if she were to sit here in her place. Sayo might not be so agreeable when it came to dealing with her sister and cleaning up after others.

“Okay,” Misaki leaned back. “I’ll do what I can. Kaoru-san…”

Kaoru picked up her mug, walking back to the couch and taking her seat next to Chisato.

“My dearest friend, we can’t show enough appreciation with mere words. Although my passion burns brightly, I find these matters hard to discuss with anyone else. Very curious. Ah, but I suppose it is what it is, because it is. Is it not?”

Misaki allowed herself a laugh, while Chisato feigned disgust. “Kaoru-san, I think that’s probably because this is real and you aren’t acting. You’re a lot more confident when you think you’re in control.”

“I knew you would understand me,” Chisato mumbled, just loud enough for both of them to hear.

Kaoru looked between the two of them. “Mayhaps I have lost my touch.”

Misaki drained the last of her coffee. “No, I think your touch is fine. It wasn’t really the same thing, but I was in a similar position before. I mean, needing help. And you were there for me, Kaoru-san, so it’s only fair if I’m here for you too.”

“What are friends for, if not to share burdens?”

“Don’t push it,” Misaki scolded. “This one’s pretty big so I’m cutting you off after this.”

“A smart move,” Chisato agreed as she stood and flattened her skirt. “I think we should end this on a more positive note. I have half a cake in the fridge.”

Kaoru perked up at that, likely less to do with the cake and more to do with the conversation ending. She was always so confident when she was helping her friends, not so much when it was the other way around. She deserved some cake, and Misaki did too. She didn’t say anything, accepting a slice from a more cheerful version of Chisato than the one that let her into the building.

From there, Misaki third wheeled while Kaoru and Chisato talked about some acting thing. Chisato had a new lead role in a popular TV drama, which explained why Kaoru was so excited for her that she forgot they were supposed to keep their distance in public. She  _ was _ happy for them, even if they were going to be troublesome. They had a lot to consider when it came to each other, if the last hour was proof of anything. To Misaki, it looked to be more trouble than it was worth, but Chisato was right. What did she know, when it came to love? She would never fit into Kaoru’s shoes, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to. She could be content with a stereotypical life, as long as it kept her free of stressful complications like this one. At least the cake was good.

Somewhere in her head, an alarm went off.

“Shit,” she stood up quickly, her plate clattering to the table. “I left Kokoro, I gotta go.”

“Hm?” Chisato didn’t even feign surprise, unconcerned with Misaki’s forgetfulness.

They’d spent over an hour sitting there while Kokoro was presumably waiting for Misaki to come back, if she hadn’t given up and left. The thought struck Misaki cold as she raced to the door, scrambling to throw her shoes and her bag on at the same time. She stood up from adjusting her shoes and slammed her elbow into the doorknob, cursing under her breath as she hissed and clutched her throbbing arm.

Kaoru launched from her place on the couch. “Misaki-chan?!”

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” Misaki choked out, unwilling to let herself delay any longer. While Kaoru’s concern was appreciated, there was no time to be fawned over.

“I’ll see you later, nice talking, bye,” she called out as she threw herself into the hallway. The ride down in the elevator took an eternity, and she spent it slumped against the wall feeling like she’d committed some kind of crime, which she may as well have. How could she have forgotten? She was the one who told Kokoro to wait for her.

A rising ache settled in behind her eyes. She didn’t really want to spend the rest of her afternoon with a headache. There was simply too much to think about, too many facets to consider about her new position, and she really needed to talk to Kanon. If Kanon already knew, then they needed to share the burden. Or, Misaki wanted to share it, rather than suffer alone in her forbidden knowledge. So Kaoru liked girls. Big deal. Maybe when she found a nice boy, they could go on double dates in the far off future.

Who was she kidding though? She was about as attractive as an unassuming pink bear. Now wasn’t necessarily the time to lament her physical appearance, or her chances of landing a date (if Kaoru can, anyone can). She had somewhere to be.

\---

She ran all the way to the shopping district, and she wasn’t the most physically fit person when it came to long distance running. Out of breath and wheezing, she paused and adjusted her uniform, so it wouldn’t look like she’d forgotten and ran an unfortunate number of city blocks. The ice cream place was actually a  _ gelato _ place, and it was just around the corner from The Kitazawa butcher shop. She had no idea if Hagumi was working today, but if she was then she prayed Kokoro had at least gone in there instead of waiting around for her for - she checked the time on her phone - coming up on two hours now. Her stomach had long since flipped itself over, gracing Misaki with unwanted but probably well-deserved anxiety. What would Kokoro think of her? She was always bossing her around, telling her to be responsible and not to waste time and other things that generally came from the mouths of what Kokoro and Hagumi described as “party poopers”.

Well, she didn’t exactly have time to worry about it. She shook her head and reached for the door handle.

Kokoro was inside, sitting at one of the three tables with a cheerful expression on her face. The bell above the door jingled, and Kokoro caught sight of her.

“Misaki!”

She didn’t look like she’d been sitting there alone for two hours. Misaki rushed over, throwing down her bag and sliding into the space across from Kokoro, and just as her butt hit the seat she remembered that she’d  _ also _ told Kokoro that she would text her when she was on the way, so Kokoro could at least put an order in. She hadn’t remembered to do that, either.

“I’m sorry I’m so late, I -” Misaki rushed out, only to be cut off by Kokoro.

“You always worry so much,” Kokoro smiled at her. “When you do important things you focus a lot, like when we write a song, so I thought maybe it was something like that. You don’t have to be sorry at all!”

Misaki felt her cheeks redden, and looked down into her lap. “Ah, well, I guess so. I just didn’t want to take so long, and I forgot to tell you when I was done. I think I’ve been distracted lately.”

“Mhm,” there was no denial from Kokoro. “But we can get ice cream, so that’s the important thing to do right now. Should we stay to do our homework?”

Misaki nodded and rubbed her forehead. “Probably. I guess we have to do it either way. Hey, were you just waiting here this whole time, or…”

Kokoro busied herself with her bag, setting it on her lap and presumably scrounging around inside for the coins Misaki had given her earlier. “Yup. I waited for you, just like you said.”

There came a pang in Misaki’s chest. “Well you didn’t have to wait  _ right here _ the whole time,” Misaki told her.

_ I shouldn’t have made you wait here, _ Misaki wanted to say.  _ I could have just asked Chisato what she wanted and left. It’s my fault. _

Her tongue remained tied, caught up in the ever-churning emotions of the day. She didn’t get truly angry often, and rarely liked to admit any kind of anger directed at her friends. And yet, she found that she  _ was _ mad. At… Chisato and Kaoru? Maybe she was just angry at the idea of being roped into something like this. Seeing Kokoro there, with a broad smile and sparkling eyes, totally content to wait for Misaki, for however long it took… and Misaki was kind of sort of supposed to lie to her about one of their best friends. For a long time, probably. 

That’s what it was. She was angry that, in a roundabout way, she was meant to lie to two very important people in her life. In the end, what she was doing wasn’t much different from what Kaoru had done to them, and to herself, for more than a year already. She was going to have to fight with her own morals, likely every day, to keep the secret. They should have waited. She couldn’t tell them that, but they should have. Lying about her friends had hurt her before.

“Misaki?”

Misaki’s head shot up. Kokoro was staring at her, head tilted.

“You’ve been zoning out a lot lately. You haven’t smiled since you got here, is something wrong?”

Sighing and shoving her insecurities out the metaphorical door, she flashed Kokoro that missing smile. 

“I’m fine. Just the usual stuff. Stress and all that getting to me.”

Kokoro hopped out of her seat. “Well, it’s time to forget all about that stress! You want vanilla, right? Ah, they have star shaped sprinkles, should we get those on top?”

“Yes vanilla, no sprinkles.”

“Okay, I’ll be right back Misaki, you stay there and send all that stress away. There’s nothing ice cream can’t make better, especially if you’re sharing with friends.”

She watched Kokoro wander over to the end of the line with a skip in her step.

If she was going to do this and be good at it, then she couldn’t let her worries show. She spent a lot of time around Kokoro, much more than Kanon did now, and Kokoro could read the emotions on anyone’s face as if they were literal printed words slapped across their forehead. She did need to send all that stress away, or hide it. For the rest of the afternoon, she was Misaki, Kokoro’s friend that wrote her songs and walked home with her every day. When she was safe and alone in her room, she could be the Misaki that lay on the floor for a couple hours, pondering her place in the world now that she had to think about a relationship that wasn’t even hers, and what’s more, one that she had to very carefully place above her own friendships.

She’d never truly hated taking on the burdens of others, but this… this was a whole different ball game, and she wasn’t sure if she could even play it.


	5. Kokoro's Guide to the Galaxy

For Misaki, there was a sense of life continuing on around her while her own felt as though it was slowing to a crawl. Kokoro continued to be occupied by other things that were not Misaki or their friends, whether it was her treasured book or whispers of more family-related business meetings. There was little Misaki could do or say to sway her from distraction, so she spent her free time at school with Hagumi and her other friends from the track and dance clubs. 

It wasn’t like she didn’t enjoy spending time with Hagumi, but for the last three years, it had been all of them together nearly every day. She was settled in her routine. The disruption was off-putting, although Hagumi didn’t seem affected by a lack of Kokoro. Of course, Misaki knew that didn’t mean it wasn’t bothering her, Hagumi just wasn’t a fan of talking seriously about things that made her uncomfortable. She could relate, in a way.

On Friday after school, Kokoro walked home by herself. There was no helping the feeling of unease that came with her absence. Perhaps it didn’t matter. Either way, she went home on her own, all the while trying to convince her overworked brain that it was a good thing Kokoro wasn’t paying all that much attention to her. It made keeping secrets easier. The knowledge she had was too fresh and she barely trusted herself to begin with. Walking home without someone to chat her ear off gave her an unfortunate amount of time - time she could use to think about things that wouldn’t leave her alone.

She didn’t like to be angry. Not at anyone or anything. Disappointed? Apathetic? Feelings she knew inside and out. She knew how to work through the periodic bouts of depression and the anxiety that followed it, even if she couldn’t always make it go away for good. Anger, though, that was different. She was starting to understand why Kokoro came across as unsympathetic when it came to emotions other people were having. If you never felt what you didn’t want to feel, you wouldn’t have to deal with making it go away to begin with. A very basic understanding of human emotion.

Maybe she had been mad at Kokoro before, just a little. But that was different, in a time when Misaki herself was a less understanding person, and they’d come a long way since then. This was two people she knew, one of whom was a very dear friend, asking for the kind of help they knew would put her in a difficult position. Not to say they weren’t in one themselves. She knew it was because her first instinct, were she in a similar situation, would be to tell her friends and not hide it from them. Wouldn’t it? Then again, she could hardly compare herself to someone like Chisato. Chisato didn’t spend all of her free time with Kokoro. To Misaki, Kokoro finding out about something was an inevitability, so keeping secrets could never be on the agenda. And yet here she was, doing just that, right? 

Kokoro and Hagumi deserved to know. They would be overjoyed, maybe write a song about it or something embarrassing like that. On the other hand, Kaoru and Chisato deserved secrecy, and beyond that they required it. Kanon knew. Misaki knew. Kaoru obviously knew. How could they be satisfied with three out of five?

The debate with herself in her head trailed off as she made her way down the sidewalk, looking down at her shoes while taking step after nervous step. She knew it was an endless loop of reasoning back and forth with no clear answer. She was definitely overthinking it. All she had to do, essentially, was say and do nothing incriminating. Kanon had done it for a year, it would be easy for her to do it too. If she could stop thinking about it, anyway.

Did she really have so little going on in her own life that the moment she became wrapped up in the lives of others, she could think of nothing else? She wasn’t even all that wrapped up. She knew one fact more than she knew before she met with Chisato and Kaoru, and nothing else was different. Why wouldn’t it leave her alone? Because she was mad about it?

_ Come on, Okusawa,  _ Misaki scolded herself,  _ you’re acting like Chisato murdered Kaoru or something.  _

Now that she thought about it, she could picture that headline about as clearly as she pictured a similar, more romantically inclined one. She had to give herself the laughs where she could.

Reaching her apartment door at long last, she told herself she had to leave her baggage outside before she was allowed to go in. 

She just had to give herself a bit of time.

\---

Misaki’s memories of childhood were not as whimsical as the ones Kokoro described to her about her own early life.

In fact, she recalled very little of anything from when she was little. She’d been trying to remember what it was like for her ever since she’d had that conversation with Kokoro, because it got her gears turning for reasons she didn’t really know. Misaki’s childhood was not particularly important to her. She never did sports, had few friends, and rarely went out. Her memories weren’t bad ones, but they weren’t great either. They just existed in a vacuum and eventually she would forget them completely, which didn’t bother her even a little bit. Well, maybe she was a bit jealous of people who could look back fondly on more innocent times. Misaki had never been that sort of person. A day happened, and then the next.

Now of course, she had many treasured memories, and the proof was in her tattered old composing book that she’d almost lost forever. Her heart strained at the thought, as if caught in a trap of her own making. That was the last three years of her life. What did she remember from before?

Here she was, lying on the floor beside her messy futon in an old shirt instead of doing her homework. This weekend, she hadn’t heard from anyone, and no band practice left her by herself for a rare free Saturday. More than once, she’d held her phone above her face and carefully typed out a text she could send to either Kokoro or Hagumi, so she could hint to them that she was bored without actually telling them she wanted to hang out. It was stupid. Of course they would want to spend time with her, if she asked. She put her phone down, disregarding her own thoughts.

Kokoro was probably busy anyway, and Hagumi had a job. It was best not to bother either of them. This line of thought was a common tactic her brain used to force her to feel guilty and deserving of being alone on any given day. 

She tried to divert from the guilt by thinking about summer break, which she now realized was the last time she’d felt any kind of normal. It hadn’t even been that long ago, it was just the first thing she recalled upon instructing herself to think happy thoughts. Rolling on her side, she considered going to sleep instead. Why bother remembering for no real reason besides distraction? She was in a similar situation, she supposed, but instead of lying on the floor to think, she really had spent her time there sleeping. Mostly because her air conditioner only worked some of the time, so it was cooler to sleep in the day.

Or, maybe she could cut herself a break for once. If she couldn’t remember happy times from her childhood, the happy times from a couple months ago were the next best thing. Kids didn’t have to worry about life and love and getting a job, but she didn’t  _ remember _ not worrying about those kinds of things. There was nothing significant she could reflect on. Perhaps she’d grown up too fast. She had two younger siblings, so maybe responsibility had wiped her slate clean and now she only knew how to be the metaphorical straight man.

There was an inkling of something though, but it wasn’t really a full memory of any kind. Once, when they were all together at Kanon’s house, Kaoru had commented that she likened Misaki to the Nighthawk seemingly out of the blue. At the time she hadn’t been able to remember the story at all, just that she “knew” it, because she’d probably read it as a kid. It was a popular tale and that was all she could be certain of. The observation had stuck with her though, because despite her relatively frequent misunderstanding of written works, sometimes Kaoru had a good point to make. A quick search on the internet later on had confirmed that Kaoru probably didn’t remember much of the story either, and so Misaki chose to interpret what she said as a compliment in regards to her perseverance. She had to make the best of what she was given. That, or Kaoru thought she looked like an ugly bird. Unlikely.

Just like that, her memory of that summer evening returned and flooded her consciousness, sweeping away the glumness. It was only a few months ago, and still…

\---

_ Summer felt like it would last forever, every single year. Not a week went by where she was left alone, dragged out left and right by the eager hands of eager friends without much of a say in the matter. _

_ Today though, Misaki had gone out on her own volition. If it weren’t for her absurdly hot room, with a window that faced the sun directly for most of the day, then she might have been more inclined to stay inside. To be fair, she hadn’t intended to go very far - only to the Family Mart at the end of her block to look for ice bars or something equally as cold. As it so happened, Kanon was also there, looking for Eve’s most recent magazine cover.  _

_ That was how she’d ended up following Kanon home, with a secondary motive of locating a working air conditioner and a tertiary one of putting off the resume she told herself she would hand out soon. Michelle didn’t pay very well. _

_ Spending time with Kanon was the opposite of spending time with anyone else she saw on the regular. She always knew exactly what they were going to do, because Kanon had the capacity to discuss actions before actively taking them, and she had the common courtesy to ask Misaki if she was interested in something instead of assuming. There was a charm to being spirited away sometimes, but moderation was always important. There was no need to brace herself, and the worst thing she’d ever endured while in Kanon’s exclusive company was accidentally burning her tongue on a fresh cup of tea. She didn’t really like tea, but Kanon didn’t keep coffee around and she didn’t want to come across as ungrateful. _

_ At Kanon’s house, most of their time was spent hidden away in her room, despite the existence of her quaint and inviting backyard. There, they caught up and traded extremely light gossip. It was like a very, very small vacation from life where Misaki could speak her mind. She could tell Kanon about bearing witness to Hagumi and Kokoro figuring out how many croquettes could fit into a single person’s mouth at any given time. She could talk about Kaoru accidentally leaving her very expensive guitar at a train station in Chiba, and the ensuing rush to find it. Kokoro had simply bought her a new one, and that had settled the issue. And then, there was the time Misaki was using the kitchen in Kokoro’s mansion, as she was now wont to do, except on this occasion someone (naming no names) had swapped the sugar beside the coffee maker for salt. Misaki took her coffee black and unsweetened, but the suits did not, and apparently she’d chosen a bad time to offer to make them mugs of their own. Kokoro, giggling and hiding in her closet, swore up and down she had nothing to do with it. _

_ “I’m glad you have her,” Kanon responded, while Misaki sat across from her expecting a laugh instead. Kanon always knew what to say, at least in Misaki’s opinion. She’d changed so much. _

_ “Me too. I’m glad I have all of you.” _

_ And  _ then _ Kanon laughed. _

_ “What’s so funny? Did I say something?” _

_ “No,” Kanon shook her head, “but you’re always like this when you complain. It’s sweet.” _

_ Misaki felt her cheeks heating up. She really had loosened up in the last year. _

_ “Not that I’m trying to avoid the conversation or anything,” she ignored the burn, “but I’m out of things to talk about. You?” _

_ Kanon smiled at her, cheeks pink from her laughter. “You know, Misaki-chan, we don’t always have to be doing something together to  _ be _ together. What do you do at home? We can just relax.” _

_ Misaki pondered for a moment, running a hand through her hair. “I know what you mean, I just don’t do much at home. As soon as I relax, some mutual friends of ours kick my front door in and tell me I have something important to do.” _

_ “I know you try to act like it bothers you when they do that, but you don’t have to pretend.” _

_ “It’s not like I’m fooling anyone anyway,” Misaki admitted, more to herself than to Kanon. _

_ Kanon stretched her arms above her head and fell backwards onto the floor. “Did you ever intend to? I don’t think you were ever that kind of person.” _

_ “I thought I was. Too cool to be friends with the class clowns. Some might say I’m the entire circus.” _

_ “It does feel like Kokoro-chan has us jumping through hoops sometimes,” Kanon agreed, “and even then I’ve always looked up to her. She really does make you feel like you can do anything if you believe in yourself. I think I’ll miss her a lot.” _

_ Kanon was of course referring to her inevitable departure, when secondary education would steal her away. She’d always talked about it positively, though, and never as if she was afraid of it. She wasn’t afraid of anything anymore, not like Misaki was. _

_ “I’m sure I’ll miss her too, whatever happens.” _

_ Kanon only hummed in response.  _

_ Misaki mimicked her friend and let herself lay down. If they spent too long on the floor, she’d fall asleep. Maybe now was a good time to ask Kanon about Kokoro’s latest “idea”. _

_ “Do you know how to skate?” _

_ “Skate?” Kanon asked, confusion evident in her voice. “Like, rollerblades?” _

_ “No, on ice,” Misaki clarified. “I need someone to teach me. Turns out it’s nothing like snowboarding.” _

_ Kanon shoved herself across the floor with her feet, until her face came into Misaki’s line of sight. _

_ “Do you have plans for the winter? It’s been a while but I used to go skating a few times a year.” _

_ Misaki shook her head and stared blankly at the ceiling. “No winter related plans at least. But Kokoro has this vision -” _

_ That was how it always started. Everything they did collectively as Hello, Happy World. Kokoro had seen an ice skating show advertisement while she was on the train, and the first thing she’d done was bring it up to Misaki. It would be a grand performance, with special effects, backup skaters… dancers… whatever they were called, and Michelle would need some very special bear-shaped figure skates. They could fill the stadium with fans young and old, and everyone would smile just like Kokoro did when she saw the people skating on the little screen above the automatic doors. It was absurd. Hardly an idea worth anyone’s consideration. They had enough trouble playing instruments on a real stage, never mind a solid block of ice. _

_ But Misaki would think of something, like she always did. Starting from scratch would be difficult, especially since she’d never even worn human-shaped skates before. They just needed to shelve Kokoro’s vision for a little while, until Misaki could make it plausible.  _

_ Kanon didn’t nod, but she did smile. Misaki knew that smile, the one she gave to everyone at the end of the show that said everything they needed to hear. That she was happy for them, happy to be with them, excited to tag along. Ready for the next adventure. _

_ “It’s a wonderful idea, but I don’t know if I’ll have the time to teach you. Why don’t you ask Kokoro?” _

_ Of course, Kokoro could skate like it was second nature to her. She was good at everything, so Kanon’s suggestion was sensible. _

_ Misaki looked away from her. “I don’t think so. I can figure it out. She doesn’t need to worry about all of that.” _

_ She knew she wasn’t making any sense. Explaining how she felt about her place in the band, her place amongst her friends, had never been easy. How could she call herself reliable if she needed to ask the very people she wanted to help for… well, for help? _

_ “It’s not always a good thing to be so selfless all the time, Misaki-chan. I know it’s who you are, but you get caught up in it sometimes. We can do it all together.” _

_ “But we don’t have to,” Misaki argued, “I can figure out the hard parts. It’s easier if I do it myself anyway.” _

_ “Some things never change…” Kanon trailed off. Misaki knew she’d grown stubborn. Protective, even, of what she’d made for herself. She was made for heavy lifting. _

_ Misaki squinted as the clouds outside passed them by and let the sun pour in through the sliding glass doors. “Not everyone can do it, but I can.” _

_ “If you say so. I’m always here if you need anything.” _

_ She said it every time, and Misaki would never ask. She just had to keep doing it the way she always had, because if it wasn’t broken then it didn’t need fixing. Kokoro was put on the earth to share smiles, not call every skating rink from her house to Chiba to find one crazy enough to host them, or to sign liability waivers. If she had to do those kinds of things, then the magic might be ruined for her. As much as she loathed their black-suited companions giving Kokoro everything she wanted without question, Misaki found that she understood why they did what they did. She was better than a black suit any day, though, no offence intended. _

_ Misaki heard Kanon’s phone ding, and the rustle of what was probably Kanon pulling it out to check what it was. She lay there silently, listening to the light tapping.  _

_ “Who is it?” Misaki had to ask, if Kanon was going to become busy suddenly.  _

_ Kanon laughed and held her phone up above her face.  _

_ “I think Kokoro has a sixth sense for people talking about her. She’s with Hagumi and they’re looking for you.” _

_ “Me?” Misaki questioned, without any surprise in her voice. “Go figure. And here I thought I had a day off.” _

_ “I’ve already told them you’re here, so I think they’re on the way.” _

_ Misaki sighed and picked at her shorts. “May as well invite Kaoru too. Complete the idiot squad.” _

_ "Ah, good idea Misaki-chan! It’s been a while since we’ve all hung out.” _

_ Misaki shot up. “I was kidding! Did you ask already?” _

_ Kanon sat up as well and held out her phone. “Yes, and wouldn’t you know it, she’s free today too!” _

_ “Ughh…” _

_ “It’s nice to see you in a good mood,” Kanon told her as she rose to her feet, “we should put all the breakable things in my closet.” _

_ Sometimes Kanon was a little too brave. Her sarcasm was so hard to read, and Misaki’s second language was sarcasm. She had a point about the breakables though. _

_ By the time their friends had arrived, the sun was starting its descent across the clear blue sky. Brilliant orange stretched out as far as the eye could see, and the heat of the day was finally giving way to a cooler breeze. That night would be special. Misaki could feel it, even though she was acting the opposite.  _

_ Kanon’s room was not very big, so it was a cozy fit for the five of them. Kokoro and Hagumi had been out downtown all day, while Kaoru had been cooped up inside rewatching old American films. She did not know English, and Misaki wasn’t sure if she knew she had the option of subtitles. It was funnier to keep quiet about it. _

_ They talked like friends did, and as if they didn’t even have a band to worry about. They could disband then and there, and it wasn’t likely anything would change. The music didn’t matter so much as the people, even though Misaki had just spent the better half of an hour trying to validate the concept of an ice skating DJ. _

_ At some point, Kanon got up and opened her balcony door. From there, the entire sky was visible as velvet red and gold bled into deep, dark blue. The colours swirled together as the evening wore on, until the sun had all but vanished on the horizon, a sharp sliver of it remaining in the distance. Misaki found herself slipping away while her friends debated whether or not they were going to spend the night on Kanon’s floor. It was all the same to her, so they could decide in her stead. _

_ The night air was a little cooler, though not by much. Summer was a brutal beast in Tokyo, and it made her hair frizzy. Kanon’s balcony was decorated with a few potted plants and a single folding canvas chair, along with a string of fairy lights that no longer worked after being left outside for a couple of years. Misaki sat herself in the chair and leaned back, turning her gaze skyward. The light pollution was pretty terrible, but she could still make out a few glimmering specks in the blackened sky. She didn’t know the first thing about stars or anything like that. Could she call it stargazing? She was certainly gazing at stars. Close enough. _

_ Her respite lasted ten minutes at most, ending as Kokoro let herself out onto the balcony and slid the door shut behind her. _

_ “Oh, I wondered where you went. We’re staying over! The suits should be here soon.” _

_ Misaki had no idea how and when the suits had acquired her sleepwear. They simply showed up with it when it was needed. _

_ She didn’t bother looking at Kokoro. “That’s fine. I’ll call my parents later.” _

_ “What are you up to?” _

_ Closing her eyes, Misaki debated if there were more pros or cons in inviting Kokoro to join her. She was still the only member of the astronomy club, and she probably always would be. _

_ She snuck a peek through lidded eyes. Kokoro was standing there innocently, hands behind her back and big yellow eyes fixed on her prize. Which was Misaki. It was always her. Why her? Kokoro didn’t give her much time to think about what to do, as usual. She took two long steps and Misaki realized all too late that she intended to  _ also _ sit in the little folding chair. _

_ “This is my chair,” she argued as Kokoro concentrated on wedging herself in next to her. “I’m literally sitting in it already!” _

_ “It’s nice to share,” Kokoro shoved her aside, while her hair bunched up and tickled Misaki’s face. “I want to sit beside you!” _

_ “I’m gonna sit on the floor.” _

_ “But you’re already in the chair, why would you get up?” _

_ “Because you’re in the chair. I feel like the armrest is gonna cut me in half.” _

_ Kokoro patted her knee. “It’s not that bad. Isn’t it cozy?” _

_ Misaki sighed, resigned to her fate. “Lying in bed is cozy. This is essentially torture.” _

_ She was trying to sound annoyed. It wasn’t working, and she could hear it in her own words. Playful was a new concept, a new tactic that allowed her to genuinely enjoy Kokoro’s company. It was easier to be that way when they were alone and she didn’t have to accidentally admit anything she couldn’t explain. _

_ “You can sleep next to me if you want,” Kokoro told her nonchalantly. “Are you looking at the stars?” _

_ “I was, but now I can’t feel my arm.” _

_ Kokoro looked between them, where their arms were crushed together. “Well it doesn’t bother me. What stars do you know?” _

_ “You’re really just doing this, aren’t you? I can’t even sit by myself for fifteen minutes when you’re around.” _

_ “What about constellations?” Kokoro looked at her expectantly. There was no hope of swaying her, and even less hope for getting some alone time. But, alone time with Kokoro wasn’t exactly a bad thing… _

_ Misaki thought hard for a moment, and came to the realization that she didn’t know anything about astronomy.  _

_ “Uh, well there’s the bears. Ursa Major and Minor. Yeah, the bears.” _

_ Kokoro laughed at her. “I had a feeling those would be your favourite. Those are also the only ones most people remember.” _

_ “Are you making fun of me? You have a seven million yen telescope in your bedroom.” _

_ Kokoro waved her off. “I never use that one, I’m not allowed to bring it to school. Plus, you can see them all with your own eyes! Look.” _

_ Misaki froze as the warmth of Kokoro’s hands spread across her cheeks. She let her head be tilted gently upwards, and Kokoro leaned in close beside her to match her line of sight. Kokoro always did whatever she wanted. Personal space didn’t exist when she didn’t want it to. Her hands were very warm and her hair smelled like expensive shampoo. Misaki could feel the silky smooth strands against the side of her face. _

_ “There,” Kokoro said, “that’s Leo. I guess it’s kinda only half, it’s too bright out to see the whole thing.” _

_ Misaki felt warm hands guide her again. _

_ “Cancer is under that, and Hydra is right over there.” _

_ “How do you remember where everything is?” Misaki found herself asking. _

_ “This is the easy stuff,” Kokoro explained, letting go of her face but not moving her head away. Not that she had much room to go anywhere. “It’s the most fun part though. You can find so many wonderful things in the stars. It makes me happy just thinking about it!” _

_ “Mhm,” Misaki leaned into Kokoro. “Well I’m no expert, but it’s kinda cool. I’m still not joining your club though.” _

_ “Awww, you’re no fun!” _

_ “Honestly, I don’t even know how you have the time to do it.” _

_ “We can start our own club. The Kanon’s Balcony Stargazing Club!” _

_ Misaki let herself laugh quietly. “I don’t think Kanon would appreciate us borrowing her balcony whenever you feel like it. There’s probably somewhere else that makes more sense, like maybe your own humongous balcony?” _

_ "Oh, right! Well, we can do it there.” _

_ “Whatever you say, Kokoro.” _

_ After that, they were both quiet, and Kokoro probably didn’t notice that Misaki had closed her eyes at some point, and was half-way to dreamland. The Kanon’s Balcony Stargazing Club was very short-lived.  _

_ Perhaps she’d actually drifted off at some point, wedged in the little chair next to Kokoro. There was a lapse in her memory, from the time she let her eyes rest to the moment Hagumi slammed the sliding door open next to them and practically threw sparklers in their direction. _

_ Just like that, Misaki was shaken from the moment she’d so carefully cultivated so that she and Kokoro could live in harmony. The space beside her became empty and cold as Kokoro leapt up with joy in her voice, as if she’d lost interest in Misaki. That line of thinking was nonsensical, clearly she was just finished with her stargazing, and Misaki had only happened to also be there with her. Besides, sparklers could be cool and fun too, and she was working on being cool and fun in her spare time. _

_ Kanon and Kaoru followed Hagumi out, and that was when Kaoru had likened Misaki to the nighthawk, because she’d been spying at them through the window and it was probably the only thing she could come up with that had to do with stars. Why that moment stood out to her was a mystery. It didn’t mean anything, not really, but she would have to look up what that meant when she got home. _

_ Misaki stood and joined her friends, failing to hold back a smile as Hagumi passed a sparkler to each of them with fire in her eyes. _

_ “We found them in Kanon’s closet,” she explained, “I love doing these!” _

_ Kanon laughed nervously. “Just be careful where you aim it, there’s not a lot of room out here. We barely fit…” _

_ “If you catch me on fire I’m going home,” Misaki said flatly. She wasn’t even sure if you could catch fire from something as innocuous as a sparkler, it was just a… sparky little stick. Just in case, though... _

_ And so they sat outside together on Kanon’s little balcony as night settled over Tokyo, watching Kokoro and Hagumi draw shapes in the sparks and trading smiles with each other. Part of Misaki wondered where she would be right at that moment, had she never met them. She’d be at home, most likely, keeping to herself. She was glad that wasn’t the case. The glowing faces around her were proof that she’d fallen into the right crowd, even if they were a little misguided sometimes. If she were meant to get lost, then she would become lost alongside them. _

_ Perhaps this really would be her happiest memory from summer; an unplanned visit and an even less planned sleepover. Happiness like this didn’t come cheap. And neither did sleep, thanks to a certain blonde snoring directly into her ear for a majority of the night. They would work on it. _

_ If only life were as simple as the night they all spent together. _

_ \--- _

The weekend had come and gone in what felt like an instant. Misaki had spent most of it asleep, unbothered by the usual suspects. She felt like only moments had passed since she’d walked home from school on Friday, and now she was already back, sharing the hallway with all manner of students who lived their own lives outside of hers. What was it like to be normal? Normal as in, not in a girl band. How long could the trend last anyway?

Kokoro was already there at her desk, her precious book open in front of her. Instinct told Misaki to wave or say good morning to her. Instead, something was welling up inside her that she didn’t like the feel of, something heavy that made her want to turn around and go home. She was still angry. Angry that she couldn’t tell Kokoro about Kaoru, angry about the little yellow book, and angry that she wanted Kanon’s Balcony Stargazing Club back so she wouldn’t have anything to be angry about any longer. 

The first thing that happened when she sat down quietly at her desk was that Kokoro noisily closed her book and started poking her in the back with the eraser end of a pencil. She was half-tempted to ignore the poking, but Kokoro wasn’t the one that had to deal with Misaki being mad, not this time. She would just have to hide it, so Kokoro wouldn’t ask too many questions. Easy, she did it all the time.

She turned around and was met with wide eyes and… concern?

“Are you mad?”

“No,” Misaki replied a little too fast. “Why would you think that?”

Kokoro shrugged. “It just feels that way. You should think about something happy so you can smile instead.”

She’d spent the whole weekend thinking happy thoughts and it got her exactly nowhere so far. Why did Kokoro always have to  _ know _ ? Well, if Kokoro wasn’t going to beat around any bushes, Misaki would make for the forest. 

“We can talk later. Class now.”

It was the best thing she could think of in the moment, and it was something Kokoro might do if she didn’t want to talk about something. Of course, she’d made a mistake in implying they really would talk later, as if there was anything she wanted to discuss with Kokoro right now to begin with. So she would have to come up with something before lunch break.

Thankfully Kokoro complied and left her alone. Misaki suspected it was less that Kokoro was listening to her, and more that class really was happening right now. She didn’t want to think so dismissively of her, but… well, Kokoro had very little tact in public settings.

By the time lunch came along, Misaki had calmed down a few degrees. It wasn’t enough to take her mind off of anything in particular, however, and Kokoro hadn’t forgotten that they were indeed supposed to discuss Misaki’s unhappy disposition that she could inexplicably sense for no reason. She followed Misaki like a faithful puppy, happy as she usually was, all the way to the grassy patches in the courtyard.

When they sat down together, Misaki chose the least significant source of annoyance to discuss, so she could throw Kokoro off the trail. Not that there was any indication she was onto any kind of trail at all. All she’d done was show concern for a friend, and, well, Misaki wasn’t exactly the best at covering up her displeasure about anything. Never had been, never would be. She wasn’t sure what being more capable of hiding her happiness said about her character. Nothing good.

“So what’s bugging you?” Kokoro asked once they were sitting, as if she were some kind of licensed therapist. All she needed was a clipboard and an expensive pen.

“That book,” Misaki found herself answering, “I know it helps you remember your childhood and stuff but doesn’t it bother you how stereotypical it is?”

A weak argument, but not wholly untrue. Maybe her subconscious had made connections between the secrets she was keeping and the stories Kokoro enjoyed reading. 

“What do you mean?”

Misaki looked down at her hands resting in her lap so she wouldn’t have to see Kokoro’s neutral expression.

“I mean… things like that are so contrived. That’s not how it works in the real world, you know?”

“Well of course, it’s a story after all. It’s not real.”

“Sometimes I feel like those are the kinds of things you want to be real though. Doesn’t it get tiring to see the same endings over and over again? The same stories?” she looked up and Kokoro’s expression hadn’t changed.

“You’re thinking too hard about it,” Kokoro said, “wouldn’t  _ you _ like to do something you enjoy over and over again?”

“I just don’t see why you enjoy it. If that’s the sort of thing that makes you happy, then you should know it doesn’t work out. Nobody rescues princesses from dragons in real life or whatever it is you’ve got in there.”

Kokoro hummed in response, tapping her chin. Even now, Misaki wasn’t sure why she was making an argument against the stupid book in the first place.

“But that isn’t what I like about it. And I think maybe you haven’t read a fairy tale in a long time, because the ones in the books are different. How would you know if you’ve never read it?”

Misaki sighed, upset with herself more than anything. “I know, I know. I guess I just… you know, you’re right. I haven’t been feeling well since last week and I think I just needed to find something to be annoyed about. I don’t know why I care so much about it.”

Kokoro scooted closer, until their knees touched. She reached out and took Misaki’s hands in hers, holding them as if she were cradling something fragile.

“You don’t have to worry,” Kokoro told her, “it’s about the endings that make you the most happy. Sometimes it’s about a princess, or maybe it’s a sad ending like in the zombie books, or maybe it’s not even over yet and you just like the story the way it is. If it makes you happy, does it matter what it’s about?”

Misaki squeezed her hands. That made sense, in fact it was pretty obvious that happiness was key to everything in Kokoro’s life. If what she enjoyed was boring and contrived to Misaki… well, that wasn’t any of her business. Kokoro’s life was still a fairy tale in itself, and Misaki had to remember that she had agreed to play along for now. Kokoro knew what she wanted, or it seemed as though she did. How long was she meant to play along?

“You’re right,” Misaki took her hands back. “I know you don’t always see in black and white, but I suppose it’s not so bad if you do sometimes. I don’t know what got into me.”

Kokoro smiled at her. “Your friends are here for you if you need anything! Even if you’re mad and grumpy.”

“I know, I’m the resident negative Nancy. That’s what you’re here for though.”

“Turning frowns upside down?”

Misaki laughed a little. “Uh-huh. If that’s what you want to call it…”

Maybe, in the end, she did know why it bothered her so much. Kokoro had this fantasy in the back of her mind, ever since she was a kid, about what she wanted to be and do and the kind of ending she wanted for herself. So did Kaoru, it seemed, and Kanon and Hagumi had promising careers ahead of them by Misaki’s standards. 

But what did  _ she _ want? What did a happy ending mean for her?

Right now, it meant summer and a cramped balcony. Maybe she hadn’t quite accepted yet that she and her friends might in fact part ways in the near future. She wasn’t as cool as she thought she was, not as content in her mediocrity as she assumed. 

So what was she to do? 


	6. A Dream Away

On the weekend, Misaki found herself standing outside the front doors of her local Saizeriya, resume in hand and doubt on her mind. A couple days ago, some kind of funk had overtaken her and every one of her thoughts, even though Kokoro hadn’t shown up with her book in a while and everything to do with her was relatively back to normal. If anything, the absence of Kokoro’s distracted state should have been an improvement. Instead, nothing had changed, at least emotionally. The feeling of uselessness was eating away at her more than the secret she was supposed to be keeping, which didn’t cloud her mind as much as it had a week ago. So if that wasn’t bothering her all that much anymore (for now), and Kokoro was back to her annoying self, there was no reason for Misaki to feel as mopey as she did.

Not feeling very good meant more time lying on the floor thinking about life and less time interacting with her friends. Schedules refused to line up for band practice, and so there was nothing else for her to do. Michelle had no promotions scheduled downtown either, and if they had no plans to perform then there were no flyers to distribute while dressed as her fluffy counterpart. 

What would Kokoro do, if she were in the same position? Misaki thought the answer would be to bother her relentlessly, but she’d heard nothing. Maybe she would do something spontaneous, and unexpected. Therefore, it would be something expected, when it came to Kokoro. So what could she expect of herself, besides responsibility taking over.

It wasn’t like she hadn’t thought about getting a real job before. Her friends had real jobs, and that was her entire purpose before she was accidentally recruited out of her first job, on the very first day. People needed money and therefore they applied for work. Misaki herself had no aching need for money in the current moment. The future was a different story, if she planned to do anything at all with her education. She didn’t have the stepping stones of family to rely on, they could only get by enough as it was. Certainly, anyone she knew would probably just tell her to ask Kokoro for a monetary favour if she really needed it, which was, of course, completely out of the question. She had never asked Kokoro for anything in her life, and she wasn’t about to start. Their friendship would remain genuine, untainted by the weight of privilege. They could be normal friends, and that was all she wanted them to be.

If she had a job, maybe she could even take her friends out to dinner for once instead of pretending she’d never seen the Tsurumaki family credit card whipped out at the register every time. Most of all, work could keep her mind busy when she had nothing else to do. 

She had not told her friends, and when she asked herself why, she found that she did not have a reason to. It was something she had decided to do on her own, by herself, and it was unlikely anyone she knew would ever see her there anyway. Spontaneous responsibility. She would not be reckless with her free time, not anymore.

Walking through the door brought back fond memories, of herself and twenty-five other girls. They hadn’t ever gone to this particular location, the insides just all looked almost identical, and that was enough to make her feel like she’d been there with her friends countless times. It was just another one of the thousands of Saizeriyas, and there was nothing special about it.

She remembered Hagumi spilling soda down the front of her blouse and Kanon wiping it up frantically. Kaoru thinking she was being smooth by sliding one table closer to Chisato’s every ten minutes, ordering individual drinks at all of them out of politeness, and then leaving them behind. Arisa playing babysitter to Kasumi, still wound up from their latest concert. Sayo berating Hina for ordering a salad instead of a side of fries, god’s only true gift to mankind. Being a waitress probably wouldn’t be so bad, with those memories to keep her company.

She walked up to the cashier and handed her application over, still debating whether or not applying online would somehow be better or easier, even though she was already there. She was met with a thank you and told to  _ maybe _ expect a phone call. At least she wasn’t the one calling around this time.

If she were to be honest with herself, she didn’t know who she was kidding. No teenager would ever make enough to send themselves to college on a part-time minimum wage job. She was already much too late to the game. This work would be nothing more than a placebo, so she had some kind of anchor that wasn’t intrinsically tied to the people she knew. She didn’t know what else to do.

Her feet took her down the sidewalk and past her apartment. Not something she was expecting, so she resolved she would walk until she felt like going home. She spent enough time inside doing nothing anyway, and some fresh air wouldn’t kill her. 

\---

Naturally she wound up at CiRCLE. Perhaps her subconscious wanted to have a look at the studio booking schedule, despite having no plans to use said studio in the coming week. Roselia posters lined the windows, announcing a joint show with Raise a Suilen coming soon to a livehouse near you. Hello, Happy World had participated in a joint live with the local preschoolers, hardly comparable, but it was a thing they did. It made the kids happy.

Marina greeted her as she stepped in the door and Misaki gave her a polite wave back. 

“Just checking the schedule today.”

“Sure, Misaki-chan. Something planned?”

Misaki shook her head. “Not yet.”

Marina pulled a thick ring binder out from behind the counter and handed it over to Misaki. It hadn’t been cleaned out in a while, there were bookings from the last three years crammed into it. She felt like the rings were going to pop open the second she touched it.

The next two weeks were fully booked out between Roselia and Afterglow, with a session here and there for Poppin’ Party. At least Marina was still getting good business despite the existence of Galaxy. There had been a scare last year, when they’d all started performing at the new livehouse instead. The new staff were nice, but Marina had always been there for them, and Misaki was thankful. 

“You look distant,” Marina interrupted her. “Something on your mind?”

Misaki stared at the schedule page and licked her lips. “We don’t have anything coming up. Honestly I don’t even know why I’m here.”

Marina gave her a sympathetic smile and leaned on the counter. 

“We usually only talk if something exciting happens. What’s your band been up to?”

Misaki closed the binder and looked around. Nobody else was there. 

“Nothing.”

Marina’s eyebrows raised. “Nothing? We’re talking about Hello, Happy World, right?”

“Yeah,” Misaki confirmed. “Nothing’s happened lately. It’s been kind of slow.”

“I guess it’s probably hard, especially with Kanon and Kaoru,” Marina stood and crossed her arms. “You’ve always been pretty casual about your studio time, even if you’ve got something up your sleeve.”

“Casual… yeah, I guess so. I think Roselia has more studio time this week than we’ve had in the last three months.”

Hello Happy didn’t try very hard, did they? But she supposed they had nothing to try for. They dealt exclusively in smiles, and only found true stages every so often. There was nothing on the line, unless they were having internal problems with each other. She missed the real stages, sometimes. They really did shine.

“Is that a bad thing?” Marina asked. “Less studio time doesn’t mean you’re not keeping up.”

“We don’t have anything to keep up with,” Misaki dismissed her. “We’ve never been all that serious.”

Marina offered her a smile. “Of course. Have we ever talked about my old band? I was just looking at some old photos before you walked in.

There was an inkling in Misaki’s brain that told her she was about to learn some kind of valuable life lesson. Those kinds of things tended to happen when she was around Marina. 

“I don’t think so. Hopefully yours wasn’t as bad as mine.”

“Depends what you think constitutes ‘bad’. Do you measure your success with your audience, or where you’re playing?”

Misaki bit her lip. That was a good question. “Well, if you were to ask my boss, she’d tell you we only measure in smiles. Not exactly easy to count, but I assume we make a lot of those.” 

She received laughter in response. “That’s very true, I’m sure you do make a lot of those. I wish we’d been as optimistic about what we should let define us as you are. If your bar is too high, you might not make it.”

Nodding, Misaki leaned on the edge of the counter. “I assume that’s what happened to you?”

“In the simplest of terms,” Marina told her. “We put too much on the line without realizing we were the ones drawing that line. I think you could probably compare us to Roselia in a way, but less humble. Yukina knows what she wants, but she doesn’t reach beyond that until she’s ready. We didn’t know how to be ready.”

“You wanted too much?”

“Not too much,” Marina corrected her, “ too much  _ too fast _ . There’s nothing wrong with wanting more as long as you don’t lose sight of your purpose. We were just impatient. Never good enough.”

Misaki picked at the countertop with her fingernail. “I don’t know what that’s like. I think our purpose is pretty mild.”

“Is that a bad thing?”

She shrugged. “It’s not good or bad. It’s not really my idea of a band, even though we clearly  _ are _ a band. Everyone else just seems so competitive, always trying to one-up each other. It’s not like they aren’t making people smile when they do it or anything. There are lower expectations for us.”

“You can have more than one goal. You sound like you’re not very sure of yourself,” Marina observed. “Is it your low expectations, or everyone else’s?”

Misaki paused to think for a moment, tapping her chin. Moderation. Competition was not moderate. It was demanding, accomplishing, and overcoming. Many nights had she spent listening to Arisa ranting over the phone about the pressures Misaki couldn’t even begin to understand. Competition meant having a realistic goal, instead of one so broad and impossible that she only took seriously because she wanted to make other people happy, like Kokoro. 

Kokoro and the rest of her friends were happy, perhaps even totally content, with where the band had come to rest. Some sort of in-between, divided between community centers and live house stages. If they were invited to play, they went. They were never there to impress, or out-do. 

“Maybe it’s all of us,” Misaki answered at last. “Maybe Hello Happy isn’t the kind of band to go toe-to-toe with anyone else.”

“Aaha,” Marina shook her head. “Of course you’re more concerned with everyone else, and I think that’s natural for you. I know it’s your job to keep everyone together in the end. Is Kokoro’s goal your goal too?”

A new question to ponder. 

“Making the whole world smile…” Misaki mumbled to herself. “Well, it’s a nice thought to have. You know, just to believe you can do that and be the change you wish you could be.”

“You  _ can _ have more than one goal if you really want to. If you feel like things are stagnant, then maybe it’s time for a change?”

Change? Hello Happy didn’t really need to change.

‘ _ Ah, but that was the very point, wasn’t it?’  _ Misaki thought to herself.

In the grand scheme of things, Roselia and Poppin’ Party didn’t exactly need to change either, they had very specific audiences as they were. They changed by choice, always aiming for loftier goals each time they reached the last. A continuous upward spiral, with seemingly no limits. Compared to them, Hello Happy was flatlining. 

In a way, she did share Kokoro’s big dream, in a fantastical sort of way. They all did, together. Sure there was a limit to what they could do, but failure was impossible. There was no risk, and yet always reward, set by their own standards. They were so lax about meeting and playing, and to what end? She would never think they hadn’t made any accomplishments in their time together, that certainly wasn’t the case. They could just do more. Do something different.

“If you love what you do,” Marina interrupted her thoughts, “then give yourself more reasons to do it. I know your friends will back you no matter what you want to do. If this might be your last year together, you could always go out with a bang, no?”

It was a proposition worth considering. Part of her was screaming that Hello Happy could never compare, never climb that mountain. They weren’t the kind of people to compete with anyone over anything. Marina had a point. Misaki thought of herself less as an individual and more of an extension of the entity that was her band, and that she had no place in suggesting what they should be doing or when they should be doing it. Kokoro was the visionary, and she made the calls. 

“Honestly, I think what I would miss most is the stress,” Misaki half-joked. It was a poorly kept secret that she wasn’t actually suffering while she carried the band on her back. It wasn’t even that bad, everyone played their part in the end. Misaki enjoyed the busywork. 

Marina laughed. “How very like you, Misaki-chan. I think your friends would love to hear what’s on your mind.”

And really, that was the kicker. They would love to hear it, that was true. What she didn’t know was whether or not that was a good thing. If she suggested they actually… compete… then it would likely be set in stone. They would never tell her no.

“I need to think about it for a while,” Misaki replied. That was the best she could do for now.

She left Marina with her thanks and more questions about herself than she’d had when she walked in.

\---

The prospect excited her so much that she could barely even think about the job she’d applied for that very same day. It didn’t seem to matter as much now. It was as if her head had tipped over and all of her thoughts had poured out onto the floor, except for the seed Marina had planted in her that made her consider that maybe, just maybe… they could mean something more than just a smile.

Not that the whole smile goal was a bad one. They could just be  _ more. _

And of course, Misaki liked to think she was good at what she did. Humble in speech and completely incapable of accepting compliments as she was, she truly believed that she was a good DJ, and maybe even a good song writer in general. She could make a good backing mix or two, even if a DJ didn’t necessarily belong in a band. But of course, Raise a Suilen also had a DJ and they took the girl’s band world by storm, cradling it with an iron fist at the will of a tiny girl with cat ears on. She didn’t talk to Chu2 often, and couldn’t even recall what her real name was, but if Misaki could do better than her then it didn’t really matter.

As soon as she thought about it, she felt guilt settling in her chest, a cold pang that she knew all too well. She felt like wanting more, wanting to be better, was against the core principles of Hello Happy as they were now. Conflict plagued her, and she found herself lying in bed with nothing to do but think about what she wanted instead of sleeping. Her visit to CiRCLE was the most exciting part of her day, which wasn’t exactly satisfying.

She wanted to talk to someone, and yet at the same time she didn’t even want to bring up the idea that she actually wanted to compete. She didn’t even know if that was what she wanted, or if what Marina said had struck her with impossible visions of grandeur in a time when she was feeling rather low about her place in the world. She could never forget how they all looked together on stage, glimmering gold and playing along to their passions. She hadn’t even taken the time to consider that perhaps the tune of her band wasn’t even suited to the kind of stage she was dreaming of. They were more like a half-time show, save for their covers. Kokoro could pull all the stops when she wanted to.

They couldn’t even stick to one genre. Hello Happy was all over the place.

Misaki put her hands over her eyes, as if the world around her would vanish as she did so. She didn’t even know who she could ask about it. Kanon might normally be her go-to with life problems, but this was a band problem. Asking the head honcho made a lot more sense, even if it was Kokoro.

She reached gingerly for her phone, and then she held it up above her head for four full minutes trying to think about what she should even say. For once in her post-lonely life, she didn’t actually know what Kokoro’s response would be to such a proposition. There was only one way to find out.

She started small - asking Kokoro if she was still awake.

Kokoro: misaki!!! what were you up to today?   
  
Skipping over the initial question entirely. How very Kokoro of her.

Misaki: not much, just took a day off. stopped by circle for a bit

Kokoro: hagumi came over and we went in the pool

She held back a frown. She had no reason to act petty, but she would have gone too if she was invited. She would trade existential crisis for a deck chair in a heartbeat.

Misaki: isn’t it getting too cool for that

Kokoro: well it’s heated, so it wasn’t that bad. why are you up anyways?

Misaki: why are you up?   
  
Kokoro: well because i’m talking to you!!

That time, Misaki didn’t hold anything in. Her smile, though small, made her feel a little bit better about the pool. Kokoro logic just worked that way.

Misaki: ah, of course. i guess that was a silly question. i have another question for you though   
  
Kokoro: oh? what’s on your mind?   
  
Typing the question was easy.  _ What if we played for real? With Roselia and RAS and stuff? _

Not exactly eloquent, but casual enough that Kokoro probably wouldn’t take her seriously. Unless, of course, she  _ did _ want Kokoro to seriously consider her proposition, because it was something she wanted to do. Part of her was still firmly in the “don’t say anything” camp, because, despite already having waded through to the other side of her pool of insecurities, she had trouble gauging the value of her own ideas. Were they worthless, or priceless?

Kokoro didn’t give her time to answer her own question. Misaki nearly dropped her phone as one of their own songs erupted from it at full volume. She answered at what she felt was light speed, desperate to make it shut up at such a late hour.

“Why did you call me?!”

“What are you thinking about?” Kokoro responded, though it sounded like less of a question and more of a statement. Maybe Misaki had zoned out a little too long.

“Nothing,” she answered automatically. “I mean, nothing important.”

“But you said you have another question? Did you forget it already?”

Misaki found herself trying to force out that question, but her mouth wasn’t having it. 

“I was just wondering if you wanted to do something tomorrow,” she rushed out. “After school, I mean. Not much going on.”

She heard Kokoro’s squeal of delight on the other end of the line. “Of course! I’d love to do something. What’s the something we’re going to do? Is it more song writing? Do you want to go to the park?”

“No songs,” Misaki shook her head to herself, “we always do that.”

Having lost control of her bodily autonomy, she could do little more than guide Kokoro in the unexpected direction she had taken them. There was no reason for her to not tell Kokoro about her chat with Marina. Maybe it was something she just couldn’t do over the phone. Maybe she was just making excuses to bury her own self-doubt.

“You can just come to my house. We’ll figure something out.”

“That sounds nice,” Kokoro replied cheerfully. “I have something to talk to you about as well. You sent me a text right when I was thinking about it. Do you think you might be a magician?”

“My magic only works backstage, unfortunately. What is it you want to talk about? Boring business meeting again?”

Kokoro hummed at her. “Well I don’t like to talk about that, it’s not a very fun conversation. It’s so weird there, it’s like the opposite of how our concerts make me feel.”

“Sad?”

“Is that what that feels like?”

“You know,” Misaki held in a quiet chuckle, “I can’t tell if you’re serious anymore. But if you don’t want to admit you were sad for once in your life, we can just say you had less fun than expected.”

“Aha,” Kokoro laughed, “well that’s true. I started wishing you were there, or maybe Michelle.”

_ Pool schmool _ , Misaki thought to herself. Maybe Hagumi got to hang out in the hottub, but office meetings were free real estate. The brief, miniscule flash of excitement she felt at the thought of being invited to something that was supposed to be important also flared up her ever-nagging depression. She’d never been one to clamor for attention. Humble as she was, her friends still helped her to feel needed and wanted.

“If you ever want me to go, then I will.”

“Maybe one day,” Kokoro told her. “I know I can depend on you, but it’s up to my parents. I’ll ask them next time.”

Misaki had no idea what she’d just agreed to, but the serotonin was difficult to ignore. She could be there for Kokoro… and of course, Kokoro had always been there for her, in her own creative way. She resolved to have a serious conversation about the band when they saw each other next, or as serious as it could be when it came to any of her three serious-conversationally-challenged friends. Then again, Kaoru had already surprised her. Again. It was more than likely that Misaki was the one who was slow on the uptake.

“Alright, well let me know. Just don’t get us into trouble, okay?”

“I would never do that,” Kokoro replied without a hint of irony. “I’m sure it’ll be a lot better with you around. I’ll see you after school?”

“We’re in the same class.”

“Oh, right! I guess in the morning then. Have sweet dreams, Misaki!”

“Yeah, yeah. Have a good night, Kokoro.”

She hung up and found that post-phone call, her body had finally relaxed. She hadn’t even realized how tense she’d been, having attributed her discomfort to tiredness alone. Kokoro was about as good at de-stressing her as she was at sourcing the stress. There was something about her that made the world slow down a little, as backwards as it sounded.

Either way, Misaki was ready for bed at last. Marina had given her a lot to think about. What felt like a dead end was slowly transforming into a new path forward, one she never thought she wanted. Hello Happy was going to end one day - that much she knew, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t put on a show.

And as she felt her eyelids weighing down, she realized that Kokoro had successfully avoided mentioning what it was she wanted to talk about. There was nothing she could do but wait.


	7. The Fork in the Road

As much as Misaki wanted to blame a higher power for the sorry state she was in, she had nobody to blame but herself. She had cast her homework aside the night before, when she’d also felt sudden inspiration to construct a song out of some old lyric art Kokoro left lying around at her place rather than going to sleep. The prospect of performing again at all had her giddy on the inside. It was the worst possible time for song writing.

The exhaustion crash wasn’t a new phenomenon; by now she was fairly practiced at forcing herself awake on three hours of sleep and downing a pitch black cup of coffee on her way out the door. She would predictably crash around noon and suffer through her remaining classes, bumming notes off Kokoro later if she happened to pass out. So far it had only happened once, but she had to be prepared. She did it to herself, after all.

She was sitting at her desk, debating whether or not it would be reasonable to lay down for the last four minutes she had before the start of class. She felt something poke her forehead.

“Hm?”

“Misaki, are you in there?”

Kokoro tapped her head lightly.

She looked up at Kokoro, casting aside the possibility of the fastest power nap she would ever take. 

“I’m here,” she replied hazily. 

“Oh, that’s good. How was your weekend?”

“Alright.”

“Did you do anything thrilling?”

“No.”

She felt as though she was staring directly through Kokoro, like she was barely there at all. There was the question of having too much on her mind to pay attention to her friend, the last few weeks catching up on her all at once. Was she the same Misaki she was a week ago? She wasn’t sure. Her eyes drooped dangerously low.

“Misaki?”

“Huh?”

Kokoro gave her a curious look. “You seem funny. Is there something wrong?”

There was no concern in her eyes. If anything she looked… oddly neutral. It was uncomfortable seeing her that way, even for the briefest of moments, but Misaki had trouble finding it in herself to say anything about it. If something was up, she would trust Kokoro to tell her like she always did.

“I’m fine,” she brushed Kokoro off. “I just sat around at home.”

“If you say so!”

And just like that, she reverted back to chipper and bright. Misaki turned her attention back to the surface of her desk, listening to the sound of Kokoro’s chair dragging across the floor as she sat down. She was really out of it today, beyond her usual no-sleep no-homework-done state of being. Closing her eyes seemed like a decent option, at least until the final bell chimed and class began. Hopefully Kokoro would take decent notes this time - Misaki was going to need them later.

For the most part she was left alone with her head down in her arms on her desk, and by the time lunch came around, her eyelids felt less heavy and her body less reluctant to stand. She dragged her feet fetching her lunch, rubbing at her eyes and trying to finally wake up for the rest of the day. She left the classroom, lunch in hand, and wandered down the halls robotically until her legs took her to the courtyard. A mix of both familiar and unfamiliar faces were scattered about the lawn, and she waved at a few of them on her way to her usual spot. Though the weather was cooling, it was still a nice enough day to sit in the grass with bare legs.

When she finally got comfortable and pulled out her lunch, she realized that something very important was missing. Something that was always there even when she didn’t want it to be. The  _ other _ important thing was also missing, nowhere to be found. When had Kokoro disappeared? Maybe she was together with Hagumi, and Misaki was the odd one out for some reason. It wasn’t like she needed to know where they were all the time.

She debated going back inside to look, while at the same time telling herself that she didn’t have to be so needy and she could eat by herself for once. Sure, they’d promised to eat together every day, but they didn’t  _ always _ . There was also plan B. She hauled herself up and shook herself awake a little bit more. She should probably be spending a little more time with Rimi and Arisa anyway. 

She found them across the lawn, eating together with their other friends as they always did. Arisa saw her from a distance and gave her a wave. 

“Where’s your entourage?” Arisa questioned as Misaki approached. 

“Dunno, probably doing something important. Do you mind if I…”

“Of course!” Rimi gestured to the empty space beside her. “You’re always welcome to eat with us.”

Kasumi gave her a thumbs up, mouth stuffed full of something. 

“As long as you share,” Tae gave her a serious look. “Payment is required.”

“You want my leftovers from last night’s dinner?”

Pondering the offer, Tae waved her hand. “We can waive the fee this time. You can have a temporary permit.”

“Thanks.”

She caught Arisa rolling her eyes as she sat down. She almost felt at home already. 

For the most part Misaki sat quietly and ate while everyone else talked about things she wasn’t involved in. Despite still feeling like she was out of place, it was a nice change. If Kokoro was off getting into trouble somewhere, she could deal with it later. 

As if Arisa was reading her mind, she brought up the question of Kokoro’s whereabouts immediately after her thought was finished. 

“Is she home sick or something?”

“No, she was in class this morning. I don’t know where she is, and to be honest I didn’t notice she was missing until I got outside.”

“Well, it’s not like she’s easy to avoid or anything. It’s a little eerie.”

“Eerie?”

“Yeah, you’re like a package deal. Aren’t you contractually obligated to know where she is at all times?”

Misaki held in a frown. “Maybe her bodyguards are, but not me.”

She had told the suits off a long time ago. They were really kind and loved Kokoro with all their hearts, but they were stifling in a way Misaki couldn’t describe. Oddly enough, they listened to her. The transfer of power to Misaki herself hadn’t gone unnoticed. At the same time, she suspected she benefited from them almost as much as Kokoro did, so they weren’t an entirely bad influence. 

“I don’t see them around anymore,” Arisa shrugged. “I used to spot them in the bushes out front.”

She was referring to the ones near the front gate, where the suits used to poorly camouflage themselves and keep an eye on their charge from a distance. 

“I’m sure she’s probably off having fun with Hagumi,” Rimi offered. “I wouldn’t worry too much if I were you.”

“I never said I was worried,” Misaki pointed out. “I’m sure they’re fine.”

“Now that you mention it, I did see Hagumi with her other friends in the hallway earlier,” Saya added. 

Great. So that meant Kokoro was probably off alone somewhere, doing who knows what without Misaki. She hadn’t even bothered to mention she was going to spend their lunch break doing something else. What if something was wrong?

Arisa nudged her shoulder. “I swear I can see the gears turning in your head. If you’re so put off then why don’t you go look for her?”

“Maybe she’s looking for you too,” Tae said. 

Arisa groaned. “If she was looking then she would literally be out here right now, idiot!”

“You don’t know that.”

“She probably just has something else to do. It doesn’t matter that much,” Misaki added.

“Uh-huh…” 

Arisa left her alone after that while they finished eating. She could survive eating lunch with other people. Half the time she told herself she wanted to be left alone anyway. Kokoro not being around still didn’t make any sense, but she could just ignore that for now. They would be back together again in class soon enough.

When the time did come to wander back to her desk, Kokoro was already there at her own and waved at her like absolutely nothing out of the ordinary had happened, as if she hadn’t completely ignored Misaki and left her alone during the break. All Misaki could bring herself to do was wave back. At some point, Kokoro passed her a note with a smiley face on it and it made her feel a little better. That meant Kokoro probably wasn’t upset with her, which she didn’t even realize she was worried about until just now. 

After school, Kokoro met her at her locker, still acting as though she hadn’t vanished earlier in the day. Misaki decided not to address it at all, reminding herself that she needed to be a little more trusting and a lot less accusatory when it came to situations like this one. Asking her why she was gone would be weird, and she didn’t want to come off as clingy, if that was even the right word. It was as close as she could get to the way she didn’t want to feel.

She wrapped Kokoro up in her scarf and they set out through the front gates. Misaki focused on the concrete instead of her friend, only perpetuating the awkward vibe she had created, while Kokoro seemed unaffected, humming to herself as they walked together. 

Luckily, Misaki wasn’t the one that needed to break the strange silence in the end.

“You didn’t seem happy today. Did you stay up all night?”

Misaki forced herself to look up. 

“I slept a little. What about you?”

Kokoro gave her a confused look. “Did you forget?”

“Did I… what did I forget?” 

They came to a standstill in front of a familiar park. 

“Well, you invited me to come over today, so I was pretty excited. You just looked really tired this morning, I thought maybe you forgot.”

She  _ had _ forgotten. Her stupid, overworked, tiny little brain had failed her again. They’d literally talked about it less than twenty-four hours ago. That and… oh no.

“Kokoro,” Misaki blurted out, feeling her stomach drop at the same time. “I just -I mean, I must have been so exhausted, I don’t know. You said you had something important to talk about . I didn’t… I didn’t remember. I don’t know what’s gotten into me.”

She felt like she’d failed Kokoro, in a way. It seemed to be happening a lot lately.

Still, she only giggled in response. “Well, that’s okay! I’m sure you have a lot to worry about. Like when I was waiting for you the other day.”

Kokoro was aiming for the heart today, it seemed. 

“I’m sorry about that too. I guess I’m just distracted, I really don’t know why I can’t keep up with you lately.”

Well, that was a little bit of a white lie. She knew what was clouding her thoughts, even though she thought it wasn’t anymore, but there was no reason for it to pull her away from her promises and her friends. 

Kokoro started walking again and Misaki made an effort to stay right at her side.

“I was actually worried about you during lunch today,” Misaki finally admitted. “Maybe it sounds stupid. Where did you go?”

“You can always just ask me,” Kokoro replied, “I didn’t want to bother you if you weren’t feeling well.”

Misaki sighed, smiling at the gesture nonetheless. “I know I get on your case about bugging me, but maybe I… miss you sometimes. You have my permission to bug me.”

“Oh, me too! But it wasn’t just that, I had some thinking to do as well, so I went to an empty classroom to eat today. I was thinking about that important thing I mentioned, because I’m not sure what I should even be asking you about.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I just don’t know! I’m sure you’ll understand though.”

“I’ll do my best… why don’t you start from the beginning?”

Kokoro nodded. “It’s not a very long story. Yesterday I was out for a walk and I realized I was close to where Hina works, so I thought I would stop by to say hello. If she was there, anyway.”

Misaki froze in her tracks, immediately realizing that the place Hina worked was also the place Chisato worked, which was  _ also _ the place Kaoru couldn’t stay away from on a bad day. The dots in her head began to connect involuntarily, palms sweating and heart pounding against her ribs. There was no way… Kokoro couldn’t have possibly found out about them on a random chance visit to the agency. Stranger things had happened to her, but this was too much. 

Kokoro had taken a few extra steps, and now she was looking back at Misaki with something akin to surprise on her face. 

“Did I say something odd?”

“What did you see?” Misaki croaked. She had to know, but at the same time she didn’t want to. 

“Well, I was going to walk in the front doors but I saw Hina down the alley, which I thought was a little odd.”

Breath escaping her, Misaki reined in her panic. She hadn’t seen Kaoru. There was nothing to worry about. An encounter with either her or Chisato was so incredibly unlikely to begin with, and yet her stomach had nearly fallen out at the minute possibility that it could actually happen at all. 

“So I wanted to walk over there and I almost called her name, but then I noticed she wasn’t alone. Aya was there too, coming out the door where Hina was. I thought I was pretty lucky to see both of them at the same time, they’re always so busy now.”

“I guess you’re right,” Misaki caught up to her on the sidewalk. “It probably does feel a little weird to see them around. They’re a lot more famous than they used to be.”

Kokoro smiled. “Mhm, it’s so hard to talk to any of them lately! At least we can still see Eve at school. Anyway, I was going to say hi to both of them, but then something happened, and that’s what I’ve been thinking about!”

“Any time now, Kokoro.”

“Well, Hina just leaned over and kissed Aya, right on her mouth! And then Aya was like-”

“Wait, she did what?”

It wasn’t that she hadn’t heard what Kokoro said, she just needed a moment to process yet another piece of information she really,  _ really _ wasn’t supposed to know about, and that Kokoro also wasn’t supposed to know about, but now she knew about it.

“She kissed Aya, so I was wondering -”

“We shouldn’t talk about it,” Misaki quickly cut in, “we shouldn’t be nosey and it’s none of our business. You can’t just talk about that kind of thing.”

“Huh? But it’s not about them.”

Misaki felt her heart pounding away again, her brain going into overdrive to steer Kokoro away from the topic of Things That Could Get Idols Fired, or at the very least start some less than kind rumors. She thought about Kaoru and Chisato, and Hina and Aya all at the same time, as if they were all involved in the same big mess she felt like she shouldn’t have any part in. What if the wrong person found out? What if it was Kokoro’s fault, or even her own?

And then she remembered - the rumors at school. The whispers about Aya.

“You can’t say anything about it, I don’t know what they’re up to, alright? This kind of thing can get people in trouble, so you should forget you saw them. I don’t want you getting caught up in something.”

She was saying the words before she could even think about them, or what the implications were. Did Chisato know? Didn’t she say something about Hina having her own problems to deal with? She didn’t want to think about it, and she wasn’t sure she could handle the responsibility of two big life-changing secrets at the same time.

Kokoro shrugged as she walked. “I just didn’t know you could do that is all, so I wanted to ask you.”

“Do what?”

“They’re both girls, and I never really thought about it before. I guess there’s nothing stopping anyone, right? Do you think they’re in love?”

This was uncomfortable territory, and Misaki wasn’t feeling all that great already. The closest she’d come to anything romantically inclined was a fake confession she’d been unceremoniously forced into years ago. 

“I don’t know. Some people don’t like it. I think it’s best to leave them alone, they obviously didn’t want anyone to see.”

She didn’t know if she was talking about Kaoru and Chisato or the girls Kokoro caught in the alley anymore. These were not the kinds of things she thought about - she’d never even had so much as a “girly” gossip session before - and talking about it with Kokoro… well, it scared her. 

“Why is that? I don’t think that makes any sense.”

“Because they could get in  _ trouble,”  _ Misaki re-emphasized, pulling on Kokoro’s sleeve to make her stop walking. “The world doesn’t work the way you want it to sometimes, so you need to keep these kinds of things to yourself.”

Kokoro didn’t look all too pleased. She didn’t understand, and Misaki didn’t really expect her to. Even she herself had a tough time thinking about… romance, and the one thousand things that could go wrong when someone became involved in it. 

She knew that what she said to Kokoro was an act of self-defense more than anything else. Right now, she didn’t have the answers her emotionally-challenged friend was looking for, and it was likely she never would. 

Kokoro just looked so let down, and she hated it. She took a deep breath and let go of Kokoro’s sleeve. Taking hold of her shoulders, she looked Kokoro in the eyes.

“Just trust me on this, okay?”

The worst part was that she couldn’t even tell if she was lying or not, or even who she was lying to. Kokoro’s smile returned to her face and she nodded. 

Misaki felt like she’d cut the head off of a very curious, very dangerous snake, and she couldn’t explain why.

\---

Kokoro followed Misaki in through the front door like a puppy, hot on her heels and their conversation more than likely forgotten already. She liked to visit, and she insisted that she liked where Misaki lived, which was an absurdly small apartment for a family of five. The pain of introducing Kokoro to her parents was long past, and now they were almost too comfortable when she was around. Any day now Kokoro could end up with a front row seat to an album filled with photos of pudgy little baby Misaki. 

She watched Kokoro fling her shoes off and race down the short hallway to her room, waving hello to the Okusawa matriarch as she sped by. Misaki let out a sigh that was half way between embarrassment and relief. 

She didn’t even know what they were going to do. Not that she didn’t like having her over, but it wasn’t like they had a pool or a tennis court to eat up their time. All they really had here was her room, which had absolutely nothing exciting in it, and yet Kokoro always wanted to come back. When she got to her room, Kokoro was digging through her closet. 

“There’s nothing in here?”

Misaki couldn’t help but laugh. There was just something about the way Kokoro expressed annoyance that was funny to her, maybe even cute. 

“I haven’t really had time to do laundry,” she patted Kokoro on the head. “There’s no law that says you have to wear my clothes to be in my house, you know. I feel like there should actually be something about  _ not _ doing that.”

Kokoro pouted, as much as someone with her happy disposition could. “Well you always have comfortable things. Is someone going to do your laundry?”

“Yeah, me. When I feel like it, anyway.”   
  
“Like right now?” Kokoro looked at her with innocent eyes, big and round and not used to even seeing whoever it was that did her own laundry.

“Why? You can live without my hoodies for a day. I still don’t understand why you don’t just get your own.”

“It wouldn’t be the same, yours are extra special. Like Hagumi’s croquettes, they taste better than the normal ones.”

“You’re making that up. What do normal croquettes taste like?”

Kokoro poked her in the stomach, “Like normal croquettes. You don’t think hers are the best?”

“I can see where you’re going with this,” Misaki crossed her arms, “but that analogy only works if you think I made my hoodies. You can literally buy the same ones at the Donki down the street, bad english text and everything.”

Kokoro looked for a moment as if she were giving Misaki’s suggestion some thought. She suddenly spun around and took a seat on the messy futon instead of saying anything, looking like she’d abandoned the idea immediately. 

“So you’ll wash them now?”

All Misaki could do was let out a groan. “You’re really gonna make me do it? We don’t have a dryer so we’ll just have to hang them up and hope it doesn’t take long…”

She  _ did _ need to do her laundry, so Kokoro’s pestering wasn’t all bad, even though she still didn’t understand it. You let a girl wear your hoodie once when she forgets her jacket, and suddenly everything you own is up for grabs. One day she would be too tall for her hoodies to look any good on Kokoro anyway.

She watched Kokoro flop backwards into the sheets. That girl could stand to learn a thing or two, if she was going to make demands.

“You’re going to help me,” she told Kokoro sternly. “I’m not your maid.”

“Do you want to be?” Kokoro looked up at her.

“No! Of course not. Get your butt out of bed and quit being so snarky. It weirds me out.”

“Why’s it weird?” Kokoro asked as she complied. “You’re weird.”   
  
“I’m not. Look, it’s not a bad weird. You just don’t act the same way around everyone else sometimes,” she flashed Kokoro a reserved smile. “You probably learn it from me anyway.”

Kokoro shrugged at her, smiling back. “You’re not everyone else, you’re Misaki.”

“I guess I am. Doesn’t change the fact that you’re helping me.”

“I’m sure it’ll be fun!”

Misaki gestured to her overflowing laundry bin. “You carry that, I’ll find some change.”

“Change?”   
  
Kokoro truly sounded mystified. Having a lot of money didn’t exactly help explain to her what people did with it, Misaki surmised. 

“Coins for the laundry downstairs.”

“Ohhh,” Kokoro nodded in understanding. “Can we use my credit card?”

Misaki offered her a smile. “No, the washing machine doesn’t take card. I appreciate the question though.”

Kokoro only shrugged and made an offhand comment about how it sure was strange that they absolutely had to use coins, because money is still money no matter what it looks like. She did have a point, and Misaki hated keeping change around. She did find some eventually, and together they carried the overflowing bin all the way down to the laundry room, a place the likes of which Kokoro had never seen before in her life.

“This is where you put the soap in,” Misaki explained to her carefully. “You need to follow the directions or you’ll get in trouble. Just one packet.”

To Kokoro it was probably fascinating. If she had ever washed a single article of clothing, Misaki would be surprised. As nice as it must have been to live her life without worrying about the little things, practical knowledge was an important life asset. What if, one day, she didn’t have anyone to pick up after her? She imagined for a moment a thirty-something year old Kokoro, sitting at her desk and searching the internet for basic instructions about washing clothes.

In those five seconds of imagination, an unintentional apparition of Misaki herself appeared, only to pat Kokoro on the head and tell her not to worry about it. 

She shook the thought away, unwilling to question why she would still be there at all. Second nature or not, helping Kokoro with anything and everything that happened to her wasn’t something she could realistically do forever. 

“How long does it take?”

Kokoro was tossing single articles of clothing into the machine, one by one, much to Misaki’s embarrassment. She wasn’t ready for anyone to touch her undergarments besides herself, certainly not Kokoro. Even though they were… best friends? Something like that. 

“You can just dump it all in at once. It’ll be about forty minutes give or take,” she told Kokoro as she took matters into her own hands, flipping her laundry bin and escaping the imminent doom of Kokoro touching a bra or whatever. Her palms reacted accordingly to the possibility alone, instantly coating with sweat.

Kokoro watched her as she closed the door of the machine. “Okay, so what should we do while we wait?”

“I dunno, my house is boring.”

“You invited me over,” Kokoro pointed out. “You didn’t think about what to do?”

She had her there. “Yeah. I guess I just wanted to hang out with you or something. Ah, I didn’t think much about it…”

Before she could feel sorry for herself, she felt fingers lace with hers. Kokoro was still grinning ear to ear. “Well we always have fun together no matter what we do. Did you know Aya has a Youtube channel?”

“Jesus, really?” Misaki felt her eyes widen. “We should probably watch her videos, for science.”

“That sounds like fun! Do you think we should make videos?” Kokoro pulled her towards the door.

“Absolutely not. Oh wait a sec, we should probably turn the washing machine on  _ before _ we leave.”

She pulled Kokoro back over to the machine and handed her a couple hundred yen coins. 

“You put them in here,” she gestured to the coin slots. “Then it’ll let you turn it on. There’s no dryer so we just bring everything back upstairs to hang when it’s done.”

“Just like at the arcade!” 

“Eh, not really. I guess there are rhythm games that do look like washing machines, but still.”

Whether she was at an arcade or not, Kokoro looked like she was having a good time just popping the coins into the slot. There was something pure about the way she could be happy about doing mundane, everyday tasks as long as she was with someone else. Misaki could only dream of having such rampant optimism. Hanging up her laundry to dry filled her heart with dread, such was the weight of a dozen water soaked hoodies.

“Do I press this?” Kokoro’s finger hovered over the start button, a clear indication that it was indeed the correct one to press.

Misaki suppressed her sarcasm, trading it for a nod. Kokoro let out a hum of satisfaction, clearly pleased with herself and her minimal efforts. It was cute. Now all they had to do was wait. Normally she would hop online or curl into a ball on the floor while she was waiting on her laundry to finish, but today she had a guest that needed to be entertained. 

Back up in her room, she felt there was little to do. Kokoro, unbothered by Misaki’s passive attitude towards her dwelling,  _ invented _ things to do. There were no crayons in sight, but the pens on the desk worked just as well in Kokoro’s hands. Blank music sheets were a decent substitute for printer paper. Normally Misaki was content to watch the magic happen from a safe distance, but today Kokoro had decided that they weren't writing music, they were just drawing for fun. And really, drawing wasn’t so different from felting, was it?

_ “It is very, very different,” _ she’d insisted, accepting one of her pens from Kokoro anyway. She hadn’t drawn anything worth looking at in years, but Kokoro was staring at her with the biggest sparkling puppy eyes in the world, so she had no choice but to make an attempt.

Many,  _ many _ attempts. No doubt she would have given up after the first botched drawing of her alter-ego, if not for the joy radiating from the girl beside her. When it was just them, a laid-back approach to Kokoro’s mannerisms was a lot easier to maintain. She loved every half-finished drawing and wanted to frame them all immediately, though Misaki was able to talk her out of it and Kokoro allowed her to throw her worst offences in the trash bin. The best one would lay on her desk until she bothered to find something to put it on the wall with, alongside Kokoro’s best self portrait. 

Despite the growing allure of participating in the simple joys, the laundry eventually did finish and they had to carry damp clothes all the way back upstairs.

“I want this one,” Kokoro pulled one of the many hoodies out of the basket. “Where do we hang it?”

“Out on the balcony, we have a drying rack. It takes a while though, so you need to be patient.”

“How long is a while?”

Misaki rubbed her temple. “I dunno, something like an hour? It’s not super sunny or anything.”

Kokoro gazed down at the hoodie, clutched possessively in her dainty hands. “I don’t think that’s fast enough, do you?”

“Huh?”

“Well, we need it to dry a little faster. Is there a way?”

“Why’s that? It’s not like we’re in a rush or anything,” Misaki took a seat on the bed. “Give me a minute, my legs hurt.”

Kokoro looked at her like she’d grown a second head. “But we have practice in forty minutes, shouldn’t we try to be on time?”

“Practice…?”

Practice. The studio. They had studio time today and Misaki had completely forgotten.

“Ah, shit. Don’t repeat that ever, also.”

And that was how she ended up dual-wielding two hairdryers on the floor of her room, while Kokoro laughed about how she was being responsible and where would Misaki be without her? Certainly not speed drying a hoodie for someone else to wear for no particular reason other than that she wanted to. Maybe it wasn’t the best day to invite Kokoro over with the intention to actually hang out.

She just had to put herself together enough to survive band practice, and then her overworked brain could take a well-earned rest.

\---

Band practice went about as well as the rest of her day had, culminating in an act that wasn’t quite as odd as dual-wielding hair dryers. By all accounts, her delivery was pretty terrible.

“Do you think we should compete?”

She was sounding more like Kokoro every day, randomly throwing in her two yen without explaining at all what she was talking about, and with zero context that might even begin to explain her line of thinking.

It was kind of Kanon’s fault, but not really. They were on break half way through practice, sitting around a table and talking about nothing in particular. Someone mentioned they hadn’t had any concerts lined up in a while, and when would their next event be? And then something about how they didn’t need to worry, maybe they could even afford to practice even less than before. It was hard for them to meet up after all. They could see each other less, it was all okay. Nothing to worry about, nothing to care about. Directionless. Misaki didn’t recall who had said what during that conversation, and it didn’t really matter all that much.

Kanon though… Kanon had put one foot forward and asked if there was anything they could  _ do _ about it. What could they  _ do _ , to bring back the spark. Where could they perform next? 

Directed at everyone’s favourite manager, no less. It made sense for her to ask Misaki, of course. Misaki gave them direction.

Reactions were mixed.

“There’s a contest coming up again, you know, for Budokan. They do it every year, with the voting,” she explained, realizing she had never properly thought about how she wanted to propose the idea to the band. “We could do that?”

“Compete? Fueee…” Kanon gripped the hem of her sweater, “ _ against _ other bands?”

“Well, yeah…”

Misaki found herself doubting her suggestion already. It would certainly introduce an unfamiliar form of pressure to the mix. 

“An admirable quest,” Kaoru gestured skyward with her hand, “to think we could challenge the likes of Roselia… a dream incomparable to any other. You wish to deliver smiles to Budokan?”

“Yeah, I get it, not really our thing. I just don’t see why it has to be totally out of the question. You don’t sound very enthusiastic.”

“It was unexpected,” Kaoru replied, “is our purpose not to bring happiness to those without?”

Misaki frowned. “Well what about our happiness? Clearly something is missing, otherwise we wouldn’t be so laid back about meeting up. We can have more than one motivation.”

“We could go to Budokan with Popipa!” Hagumi shouted, as though she’d just come to the realization. “That would be so much fun! They go to that, right?”

“Well, if they get enough votes they do. I just think it would be a nice change of pace for us.”

Kanon, still looking unsure, nodded. “It’s… not a bad idea. I think it would take a lot of getting used to, and some extra work. You’d be okay with that?”

She was referring to Misaki’s background work, booking venues and studio time and preparing flyers, among other things. 

“Yeah.”

Misaki had not actually considered the extra work at all, but she’d handled worse. 

“I’m alright with it, as long as we just have fun trying. I don’t want to make anyone feel bad if they don’t get enough votes.”

“Well, I think they would be used to it. They sign up knowing the rules, Hagumi.”

“I guess you’re right. It does sound like fun, yeah?”

Kaoru ran a hand through her hair. “Of course, there’s always fun to be had when we’re performing on stage, no matter where it may be. To support your dream, dearest Misaki-chan, I would do anything...”

“A yes is enough, but thanks I guess.”

They’d all agreed so far, despite hints of reluctance. The idea  _ was _ a little outlandish for them, considering what they were used to. Regardless, she truly believed they could do it, or at least put up some kind of fight. With a little tweak here and there to some of their music, and extending a branch or two into a few more genres, she was positive Hello Happy could make a different kind of impression without losing who they were in the process. 

But despite being the manager, Misaki was not the leader. The final decision rested on the shoulders of Kokoro, who wasn’t exactly one for the kind of competition it was going to be. She was the only one who hadn’t said anything yet. Misaki turned in her seat, giving Kokoro her full and undivided attention, the rest of the band following suit.

“What do you think, Kokoro?”

Misaki already knew what she would say. She knew from the moment the words left her mouth that Kokoro would agree to it, even if she didn’t exactly want to. A part of her felt bad about it, as if she were abusing Kokoro’s kindness to take them all in a new, questionable direction. If it didn’t work out, she would pull the trigger and call it quits, easy. There was always a way out.

“I think,” Kokoro began, eyes fixed on Misaki’s, “that if it will make you happy, then we should try it. We should do things that make us happy too, after all.”

The lack of unbridled excitement was indication enough that Kokoro would probably not be interested if Misaki had never asked. If she was going to allow such drastic change, then Misaki needed to live up to her expectations. Happiness drove a hard bargain, but Misaki could afford it with diligence and determination. 

After practice, Misaki stood alone with Kokoro by the curb, watching the sun vanish on the horizon while waiting for a ride. She wasn’t sure what to say, but her mouth moved anyway.

“Are you sure you’re okay with this? It’s your story, after all.”

“ _ Our _ story,” Kokoro corrected her, “we all write it together now. Trying new things is good, we do that all the time.”

“Not like this. You know it’s different.”

“Maybe,” Kokoro shrugged. “What’s important is that we keep doing it together. You’ve never let us down before, so I believe in you. Just don’t forget to have fun, Misaki.”

“Always with the fun… as long as you’re here to remind me, I suppose it won’t be possible for me to forget.”

Kokoro giggled quietly. “I’ll always remind you! And I’ll remind you about practice next time too.”

“Hey! I’ve had a lot on my mind lately!”

The cool of night set in as they bickered back and forth. Even though the banter with Kokoro still felt new, it warmed Misaki all the same. It was like she was reassured that she was going the right way, making the right decision. If Kokoro was still smiling, then the earth was still spinning.

She had a lot of work to do.


	8. The Principle of Happiness

The sun had already set by the time Misaki was out of work, leaving her eyes heavier than usual and her back in unfamiliar pain. She had to be out the door and on her way as soon as the clock struck eight, so she’d at least have a little time to get things done. There was no need for free time for herself, especially when she had more important things to do. She hadn’t told anyone about her real job yet, but nobody had asked her what she was up to either. Waitress work was easy compared to what she was used to.

Tonight she had a meeting to squeeze in with Arisa. She’d given herself a new mission; to learn what exactly it was that made the other bands tick. If she knew what their goals were, then maybe she’d have an easier time motivating both herself and the rest of Hello Happy. There had to be something more to Poppin’ Party than just wanting to play at Budokan over and over again, though that’d be an accomplishment in itself. Just not one with significance to Hello Happy.

Arisa was a way to get her foot in the door. Would she laugh? Probably. Misaki had a hard time taking her own band seriously too, but not in a bad way. They just didn’t fit the mold, so she had a lot of work to do - perhaps even break said mold.

Cooler evenings prompted her to double up her hoodies. She stepped out of the restaurant under the darkening sky and made a beeline for Arisa’s house, missing the scarf she had given to Kokoro the day before. She swore her reminders were going in one ear and straight out the other side, an unfortunate trend she’d long learned to live with.

Thankfully Arisa’s basement was warm, and she had coffee.

“You’re doing what now?”

“I know, I know. Doesn’t really sound like us.”

Arisa sat across from her in a questionable rabbit-shaped chair, her own cup of coffee in hand.

“You’re telling me. Do you really think people would… you know… vote for you guys?”

“If anyone voted for us as we are right now, I would question both their sanity and their sense of humor,” Misaki said as she fiddled with the handle of her mug. “I don’t think we would have any business being taken seriously. That’s why I’m doing research.”

Arisa leaned back in her seat. “I see. Well, you have a lot of work to do, Okusawa-san.”

“Call me Misaki, please.”

“The Girls Band Party isn’t as easy as it looks,” Arisa ignored her request, “do you know how many bands enter in this prefecture alone? I mean sure, you get a lot of real amateurs, but there’s still some legit competition.”

“Outside of you, Roselia, and Raise a Suilen? I feel like we don’t have to worry about anyone else.”

“Very presumptuous of you. Roselia has the benefit of being an all-female band playing kind-of metal songs, which is like an automatic plus. Raise a Suilen has professional level production done by a fifteen year old musical prodigy, and we have uh… well, we have Kasumi, you understand. What do you have?”

Misaki sighed. “Asking the hard hitting questions already. Isn’t that what I’m supposed to be doing here?”

Arisa waved her free hand. “Hey, I’m just being realistic. It’s not a rhetorical question. What do you have that the rest of us at the top don’t? Like, I don’t mean that in a discouraging way or anything-”

“It’s fine, I get it,” Misaki nodded. “You’re right. I haven’t really thought about it like that before.”

“Alright, so what do you have? Gimme a list, right now.”

“Eh? Well…” she leaned down and set her mug on the table. “I guess, we have a really big budget. We can buy whatever we want. We have nice instruments? Popular with… kids? And seniors?”

Arisa gave her a look, raising her eyebrows and silently asking for more. Raise a Suilen had a colossal budget too, and they actually put it to good use with a state-of-the-art recording studio. Hello Happy’s “budget” was spent almost entirely on having custom outfits made for Michelle.  _ Every _ band had nice instruments. They didn’t have any cool metal songs. They didn’t have a Kasumi, whatever that meant. 

What did they have right now? Misaki mentally sorted through their discography and every live performance they’d done in the last year. She settled on something she had, until now, considered to be a fault.

“We have variety,” she told Arisa. “We’ve done so many different genres that I’m pretty sure I could write any style of song. I know that’s not huge, but…”

“You have  _ you, _ idiot. God, are you sure you’ve only got three empty heads in your band?”

“I’m nothing special,” Misaki muttered. “Unless you mean the other me. I guess we do have that.”

“I’m not talking about the bear. Look, I don’t know if you know this, but the rest of us write our  _ own _ sheet music. Once we have a song and a rhythm, we all have to sit down and write our own parts, and then we memorize them later.”

Misaki shrugged. “Yeah, anyone can write a good tune. You’re just proving my point.”

“I’m proving the opposite, stupid. I’ll take a wild guess and assume that you are the one and only writer in Hello Happy. Kokoro doesn’t count if she isn’t physically putting notes on paper.”

“Is it really that wild? It’s just… music.”

“Yes!” Arisa shouted at her, clearly exasperated. “You do all of it! Do you know what that means? You can write anything, for any instrument. How did you learn to do that?”

Trying to escape Arisa’s intense gaze, she turned her attention instead to the chocolate cornet shaped pillow on the couch beside her. Rimi was much easier to talk to.

“I just picked up a few instruments here and there when I had free time. Kokoro has everything at her house, so it isn’t hard.”

“Yeah, right,” Arisa crossed her arms. “It’s so easy to just pick up any random instrument that you’ve never seen or held before and learn how to play it well enough to write stage performance tier music for multiple people over the course of like three months. Easy peasy.”

“It’s just hard work, nothing special. I just did what I had to.”

Arisa ignored her. “You could pick up anything! If you told Kokoro you want to play second guitar she would probably bend over backwards to fit you in. Can you play drums? Electric violin?”

“I can play drums, but I’m not a fan. I’ve never played an electric violin but I assume it isn’t that different from a regular one, so probably?”

“Exactly! Do you even hear yourself right now? It sounds like you’re so busy making dreams come true or whatever the hell it is you do that you’re turning your back on your own potential. Get your shit together and then maybe we can talk about playing Budokan.”

Her own potential? Arisa had no idea what she was talking about, all it was… well, it was just honest hard work. If she hadn’t done what she did, they wouldn’t even be a band right now. Probably.

“So your advice is to… utilize my potential? Isn’t that what we’re all doing?”

Arisa rolled her eyes so hard Misaki swore they were going to fall out of her head. “No, my advice is that you need to realize what your potential actually  _ is. _ And  _ then _ you can utilize it. With us, well… Kasumi is pretty good at figuring out what makes all of us special. Having that confidence helps me - er, us - a lot.”

What Misaki parsed from that wasn’t exactly thrilling. If she needed to be special in some kind of way, then the road ahead was even harder than she had expected it would be. It wasn’t like being able to play more than one instrument was difficult, it was just time consuming. Her friends were always depending on her, so of course she didn’t have a choice in the matter. Doing what she had to do was not particularly notable. 

Still, she took what Arisa said to her and filed it away for later, thankful for  _ some _ kind of guidance.

\---

A few days later she found herself sitting across from Sayo at Hazawa Cafe. Kokoro had come dangerously close to coming with her despite being told not to come and to leave it to Misaki, but a dark limo had pulled up to the school just as they were leaving. An absurdly common occurrence, so much so that it was completely ignored as Kokoro was hurried inside and shipped off to an aptly timed business meeting. Still unsure of exactly what these meetings entailed, Misaki had just waved her off and told her to wait until after the meeting to text her this time.

She had fourteen new messages already, barely thirty minutes later. Sayo observed Misaki’s phone vibrating across the table with curiosity.

“Is it important, Okusawa-san? Perhaps you should take a moment to respond.”

“No, definitely not. You can just ignore it.”

Sayo nodded. “Alright. What did you need to talk to me about? I have to admit, I wasn’t expecting you to invite me out.”

“Yeah, I get it, we don’t talk much. I have an important question though, and you were the easiest option.”

“I’ll do what I can to help.”

Sitting across from Sayo made Misaki realize how much she was slouching. There was something about Sayo’s steady gaze that made her want to sit up straight and maintain eye contact indefinitely. Intimidating wasn’t the right word, Sayo was anything but. Maybe it was Sayo’s confidence, radiating off of her and unintentionally mocking Misaki’s casual nature.

“What is it that makes Roselia successful? I mean like, what is it that makes you competitive with other bands?”

If Misaki hadn’t been watching Sayo’s eyes, she might have assumed her question went unheard. The reason she was asking had to be obvious, and part of her wondered if her companion would simply get up and leave at the audacity of it all.

Instead, Sayo clasped her fingers together and narrowed her gaze.

“We are not what I would call successful. Not yet. I don’t think you should aim for your definition of success. From my perspective, it’s something you already have.”

“Already…?” Misaki had expected many answers, and what she’d just heard was not one of them. “I’m not sure what you mean. You’re saying Hello Happy is successful?”

Sayo’s posture relaxed and she leaned back in her seat. “I’m surprised you don’t think so. I would even go as far as to say that I envy you.”

“Alright, now I know you’re pulling my leg. I’m trying to be serious, which I know sounds a little ridiculous coming from me.”

“I am also serious. Every time you play, you achieve your goals and satisfy your purpose. You shouldn’t be ashamed of simplicity.”

Misaki’s phone began vibrating again.

“Oh, I get it. Well, it isn’t like we haven’t been called simple before.”

Shaking her head, Sayo offered her explanation. “I’m not calling you simple, I’m saying that you and your band are not dragged down by complications. While you’ve found your sound, Roselia is still searching. I don’t know if we’ll ever be what we want to be.”

Rubbing the back of her head, Misaki pondered how to even respond to that. “Uhh, well I mean, I don’t think anyone else sees you that way. You’ve always kind of been on a pedestal, in a way. I thought you guys just wanted to be the best or something?”

Sayo nodded. “I can see why you would think that. But what does it mean, to be the best? The best at what? Every year, we outdo ourselves. We play bigger stages, we write more powerful music, and we become closer. But what does the end look like? How can we tell we’ve reached it, and where do we go from there?”

“The end? I never… I never thought of it that way. I think the end of Hello Happy is just around the corner… and I…”

She’d never  _ said _ it like that before. No matter how many times she told herself it was coming, and that she would be okay with it, speaking it out loud made her feel like she’d never even spent a full minute considering what it meant. 

“It is a little bit late to decide you want to be serious about music, in all honesty,” Sayo continued, “I don’t think you have enough time to reconstruct your band. It does what it was always meant to do, and now, at the end of the line, you want to change the direction.”

Misaki felt like she was being called out in some way, like she was a little kid with a toy piano who wanted to play with the big boys now. She had come to Sayo for advice, and she was essentially being told that they couldn’t do it anyway, so why even try? She felt her hands ball into fists against the table and she couldn’t meet Sayo’s gaze again.

“I didn’t expect that would make you so upset. I had always thought you were the most realistic of your friends.”

“I’m not upset,” Misaki insisted, though she was sure her tone betrayed her. “This is something I want to do. I don’t want to believe we can’t, especially when I’ve worked so hard…”

“Can you tell me why you want to do it?”

Her mouth agape, Misaki quickly realized she didn’t have a simple answer to a simple question. There were so many things she could say. She didn’t want to let the band go, but that was all too obvious. Maybe she wanted to send them off with a bang. She wanted to challenge herself. She wanted something to distract her from the intricacies of life. From Sayo’s perspective though, Misaki guessed that none of that would necessarily be considered reasonable. If she was going to reinvent the wheel, she needed a damn good reason.

She needed to be honest, with both Sayo and herself.

“I don’t have a future,” Misaki told her. “I never had any dreams, no special talent, and academically I’m one of the most average people you’ll ever meet.”

“So you want to make this your future?” Sayo said, less of a question and more a statement.

“It could be. Everyone keeps telling me I’m good at it.”

“You would be better if you took off the bear suit. Giving yourself a handicap is not advice I would share with you.”

“Hey now-”

“I’m curious to know who it was that let you put it on in the first place.”

“Well, wait a minute -”

“You don’t have minutes left to wait,” Sayo calmly interrupted. “Pardon me for cutting you off, but if you intend to make a career out of it then you need to make some sacrifices. Especially if it’s only going to be you.”

It wasn’t like Sayo was wrong or anything, it really would be just Misaki on her own. Rejecting reality wouldn’t make it any less true. Her friends had lives! If she was lucky, maybe Kokoro could come along too. She had all the money in the world, right? She could come. She could...she could…

The sharp pang in Misaki’s chest was all too real. “I don’t know what I want. But this is as close as I’ll get to knowing for now.”

It was as honest an answer as she could give. Asking her friends for help had turned into scaling an impossibly tall mountain. How were they supposed to go from children and seniors to something  _ more _ ? Realization dawned. These friends, who had their own voice and their own purpose, could not help her. They weren’t going to hold her hand and reveal to her the secrets of girl bands and how to become cool and popular in five easy steps. They were going to tell her the truth, and it was her job to take that truth and turn it into something she could work with, whether she liked it or not. 

If, after everything, she was going to be left alone… 

“I get it,” she told Sayo. “The things that you do, the things anyone else does isn’t going to work for us. We’re not really in a position to be making such drastic changes. But isn’t that what we’re good at? Making the impossible possible?”

Sayo hummed to herself, evidently pondering Misaki’s observation. 

“Now that I think about it, I suppose it is what you do best. I have seen your band perform in ways I would never expect from… aspiring professionals.”

“Expect the unexpected?” Misaki offered.

“And then it becomes the expectation,” Sayo replied. “I still believed what I said earlier, that it’s too late for you to change. At the same time, I also believe that if anyone can do it, it’s you. My advice to you, from one musician to another, is to challenge expectations.”

“Of course,” Misaki nodded. The positivity was refreshing. “I feel like I’ll even have to surprise myself with this one. I can pull a rabbit out of a hat, but you’d probably see it coming.”

Sayo nodded.

“So in the end, it’s about what I make that rabbit do. I think I get it now. At least, I have somewhere to start. Thanks.”

“I hope you can achieve your goals,” Sayo offered her a small smile, though she wasn’t looking at Misaki. Following her gaze, she spotted Tsugumi walking in the front door. Sayo had mentioned she would be busy today, with Misaki’s company the sole exception to her schedule. 

“Alright, I’ll see you later then.”

Misaki stood and gathered her coat. She had more questions now than she had before sitting down at the table, but this time it was probably a good thing. She needed to talk to someone while it was fresh on her mind. She whipped out her phone as she stepped outside into the cool air and sent a few texts, hoping for the best. 

\---

The best happened to be Kanon, and only Kanon. She should have expected as much.

Kanon had been out shopping around the same time Misaki left the coffee house, and they’d met up outside of CiRCLE to sit and chat into the evening.

“So what I’ve learned is that we essentially need to do what everyone else is doing, but we need to be us when we do it,” Misaki explained. The concept was simple enough, execution was a different obstacle. 

It was very unlike Kanon to look confused when she was talking with Misaki. 

“What?” Misaki asked earnestly. 

“You sound a lot like Kokoro-chan right now. I, um… I don’t really get it. Aren’t we already being us?”

Of  _ course _ she sounded like Kokoro, her mouth was moving faster than her brain. Kanon had no context! In an astonishing turn of events, Kanon had become the Misaki, although a much kinder and more understanding version of her.

“I know that’s not very helpful, sorry. What I mean is, every other band has something special to strive for. You know, something actually achievable. So they all have these interesting spins on what it means to be a band.”

“Okay, I understand that part at least!”

“Yeah, so I talked to Arisa and Sayo and from what I understand, none of what they do is gonna work for us. I thought about trying to talk with someone from Raise a Suilen, but I don’t think the outcome will change. So what we have to do is take what they do and  _ make _ it work for us.”

Pursing her lips, Kanon’s expression remained the same. “You don’t think we have something special?”

“No! No, that’s not what I’m getting at. I mean, of course we do. I’m just saying, the special we have and the special we need to be a real competitive band are two different things.”

“I really think you should talk to Kokoro-chan about this. She’s the leader after all, I think she would know what to do better than I would.”

Misaki sighed and leaned back in her seat. “I mean, I did message everyone and you were the only one who replied. I was pretty happy to talk to someone with a brain, you know.”

Kanon let out a quiet giggle. “Well, I’m usually on everyone else’s side when it comes to things like this. It’s not very often that you’re so enthusiastic about performing. I’m glad that you’re excited, even if I don’t exactly understand why.”

“Well, I appreciate that, even if you don’t get it.”

It was apparent that Kanon wasn’t exactly picking up what she was putting down. And why would she, when Misaki was acting so out of character… Well, it wasn’t  _ that _ far-fetched, was it? For the most serious member of the band to finally want to take it seriously?

Kanon leaned in a little closer from across the table.

“I think you know that we would all be willing to support you in the end, whatever your goals are. W-well, I would like to, if I can. Maybe it would help if you could tell me why you’re so caught up in this all of a sudden…”

“That’s fair,” Misaki said. “I just think… that if I want something to change, then I should be the change.”

“What are you changing?”

Misaki took off her hat and ran a hand through her hair. “Anything. I just need something to happen.”

“I see,” Kanon nodded. “I believe we can do anything if we really try. Even if we don’t know what it is yet. And even though I’m a little nervous… I’ll do my best!”

She’d been apprehensive when Misaki had brought things up last practice, so the support in spite of her feelings was welcomed. She would have to be sure not to let Kanon down, or anyone else for that matter. There was no sense in getting everyone’s hopes up (if they had any) if they weren’t going to make it. 

It was at that point in the conversation that Kokoro happened to come by, and she had spotted Misaki and Kanon before they’d seen her. 

“Hey wow, both of you are here! How lucky!”

“Or unlucky, depends on your perspective,” Misaki rolled her eyes, smiling all the while. 

“Kokoro-chan, it’s good to see you!” Kanon ignored the jab, all in good humor of course.

Kokoro sat down next to Kanon, apparently having nothing to do but sit around and twiddle her thumbs. 

“Did you see my text?” Misaki asked.

“Hm? Oh, no. I forgot my phone at home today.”

“Yeah I guess that sounds about right.”

“Don’t worry -” Kanon was cut off by the sound of her phone alarm.

“Oh, that’s my reminder. I have a late shift today so I should really get going! It was nice talking to you, Misaki-chan. And you too,” she gave Kokoro an affectionate pat on the head. “Even if it was only for a minute.”

“Am I babysitting now or something?” Misaki asked herself as she watched Kanon gather her belongings.

“I could babysit you instead,” Kokoro offered happily. “We can take turns.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Kanon laughed between the two of them and said her good-byes, leaving Misaki sitting alone across from Kokoro. 

“I guess I really am stuck with you, huh. But I did want to talk to you, so I suppose it isn’t so bad.”

Kokoro grinned. “Okay, what did you want to talk about? I have nothing to do for the rest of the day!”

“Why do I feel like you’re inviting yourself over to my house?” Misaki asked. “It’s getting cold out here so we’d better get a move on.”

Inviting herself over was a bit of a stretch, Misaki had done it all on her own in her unique I-don’t want-this-but-I-want-this way. She really did want to talk, just not outside. So they walked to Misaki’s place together, and it would have been nice if Kokoro hadn’t been eerily silent the entire way there, save for a quiet tune she hummed under her breath.

\---

The first thing that happened upon entering Misaki’s room was not a conversation about the band, as Misaki had hoped it would be. Instead, she was confronted with another episode of Kokoro’s unrivaled perception.

“I was wondering, have you talked to Kaoru? She still seems funny. It’s giving me a strange feeling in my stomach.”

Misaki slumped to the floor, laying back across her unmade bed. The absolute last thing she wanted to talk about. She had more than enough on her plate.

“Misaki?”

Fighting the butterflies in her stomach, she foolishly attempted to block Kokoro out by covering her eyes with her hands. If she could will herself away, she would have. That sort of magic wasn’t in her repertoire. 

“I talked to Kaoru. It’s not something you need to worry about, she can handle herself.”

When she uncovered her eyes, Kokoro was sitting on the ruffled sheets beside her, staring intently. “What did she say? Is she okay?”

“Why don’t you ask her?”

Kokoro shook her head. “You know I’m not very good at that kind of thing. I can make Kaoru smile anytime, but you told me yourself that smiles don’t make problems go away.”

Misaki sighed and sat up. “That’s right, they don’t. Sometimes though, people have private problems that aren’t meant to be helped in the way you want to. It’s not like fixing up the theme park or coming up with a song.”

She had to wonder if Kokoro knew she was leaning over a little, and now their shoulders were touching. Those big yellow eyes were awfully close. She wasn’t ready to have this conversation, not yet. If they talked about it, then she probably wouldn’t be in the mood to discuss the band afterwards. 

Through her blinds, she could see red bleeding across the horizon, and her room seemed a little dimmer. If she could somehow get everything out in the open without being literal… being the responsible one  _ really _ sucked. 

“What kind of problem does Kaoru have?” Kokoro asked.

Misaki’s eyes traced the outlines of their hands between them. Kokoro’s hands always looked like she’d just walked out of a salon with nails so shiny she could see her reflection in them. Did Kokoro even know what a callus was? Vocalists had it so easy…

“Can I ask you something else first?” Misaki turned to her. “And then I’ll tell you about Kaoru.”

Everything in her mind screamed at her to take back what she’d just said. She wasn’t supposed to tell anybody. But how could she explain it? Kokoro wasn’t just anybody. If she was going to find out, then it should be through Misaki. She listened to Misaki. She wouldn’t tell anyone. She deserved to know. 

The fight to justify why telling Kokoro was a bad idea had come to an end. Maybe she was too soft now. Then again, she’d  _ always _ been a little soft for her.

Kokoro listened intently to Misaki’s recount of her visits with Arisa and Sayo, and what Kanon had told her when they met up. Surprisingly, she didn’t seem to have much to contribute, only offering a nod or a “mhm” here and there. She seemed… tired.

“So you’re looking for something special, but a different kind of special?”

“About us, yeah,” Misaki nodded. “I think if we can figure it out then maybe we could step it up. You know, show everyone what we’re made of and all that. You’re the leader, so I don’t want to do anything you’re not interest-”

“Well, Arisa was right I think,” Kokoro interrupted. 

“Eh? About what?”

“You being the special thing. That’s what I think as well.”

“Ahh, not you too…”

Kokoro leaned back on her hands and the warmth of her shoulder vanished. “You don’t think so? Well, I can tell you’re super serious about this. It’s like when you’re serious about small stuff, like band practice starting on time.”

Misaki shrugged. “I guess so. I don’t really know what I’m feeling.”

“That’s okay, me neither! That’s why I ask you so many questions. Hmm, but right now you’re a different kind of serious. You’re thinking about so much by yourself.”

“Well, then think about it with me. Am I making any sense?”

“I’m already done thinking about it. Maybe it’ll help if I’m serious too? Just for a minute, so I can help you.”

Misaki chuckled at her. “For a whole minute? I’d pay to see that. But I guess I would appreciate it, if you’ve come up with your own solution so quickly.”

“Kasumi told me that Arisa said you said I’m a genius, so-”

Misaki shoved her hand over Kokoro’s mouth. “Yes yes, I get it, you’re smart and your brain is huge. You get sixty seconds of serious time starting right now. Any longer and I’ll get uncomfortable.”

She pulled her hand away, ready for what she assumed would be something of a nonsense-suggestion. More fireworks on stage or something. Do a flip. Jump out of a plane.

“I think Michelle should take a long break,” Kokoro said. “A real long one. I’m sure she won’t mind, right?”

“Huh? But.. you mean you don’t think we need a DJ?”

“Oh we need a DJ, for sure! I know a real good one. Something tells me she can handle anything Michelle can.”

Cheeks heating up, Misaki crossed her arms because she didn’t know what else to do with them. 

“Didn’t we try that already? I wasn’t exactly stage material back then.”

Kokoro leaned back in again, brushing Misaki’s shoulder. “Maybe you couldn’t do it then because you’re supposed to do it now. Everyone sees us as different, because we’ve had Michelle all this time. But now it’s normal, and even though everyone loves Michelle, I think seeing you on stage might be a little more exciting.”

“Well yeah, but it’s still just m- I mean, I don’t think I’m any different from Michelle. Not that it’s a bad thing that we’re the same. I do like her-”

“You’re  _ not _ the same,” Kokoro insisted confidently. “You’re Misaki.”

“We  _ are _ the same. I know I’m beating a dead horse that I put behind me like two years ago, but we’re the same. I  _ am _ Michelle. You don’t have to like it, but that’s the truth. I know you don’t get it.”

She could recognize the returning irritation that came hand in hand with trying to convince people she wasn’t a magical bear, something she hadn’t felt strongly about in a long time. A conversation about how talented and special Misaki was couldn’t happen with Michelle in the same room. 

“You are Michelle,” Kokoro told her, “you used to tell me all the time. If doing something we’ve never done before will make you happy, then I think you should be the difference.”

“I can’t tell if you’re agreeing with me about Michelle or not.”

“Does that really matter? Are you happier if I agree?”

“The way you said that doesn’t sound very good, just putting that out there. But… no, I guess that doesn’t change anything. Are you happier if it’s me?”

Kokoro had this soft smile she did whenever they had moments, and she was doing it right then. The butterflies were back in full force.

“You always worry after everyone else. I think we should talk more about what you want to do. Without Michelle. Would you try it with me?”

What a pain this girl was, always pulling at her heartstrings and stretching her to her limits. Sixty seconds had to have passed by long ago. Her eyes saw straight through Misaki, like they always did when they were together like this, and she would never admit it to herself or to anyone, but she couldn’t look away. Kokoro was the most sincere person she’d ever met. Whether it was a curse or a blessing, she didn’t know.

“Try what?” Misaki asked quietly.

She let Kokoro take her hand, willing her palms not to sweat.

“Being Misaki. Just you, for now.”

Kokoro really was one in a million. Misaki was lucky to know her.

She couldn’t help but laugh, and Kokoro joined her even though they weren’t really laughing about anything in particular. They were just sitting together in Misaki’s boring dark room, trying to figure out the answer to the universe and beyond. That’s what it felt like they were doing anyway.

“I guess I could give it a shot. Maybe I should have just sent you to talk to Arisa yourself,” Misaki said once she caught her breath. “You make everything sound so simple.”

“And you make everything confusing!”

“Yeah, maybe I complicate things a little bit every now and then. I guess that’s what you’re here for. Talking sense into me.”

Kokoro smiled in return, and they sat in the dark for a while without talking. Misaki was acutely aware of her still playing with her hand, brushing against fingers so rough they probably didn’t even have fingerprints anymore.

“Are you going to tell me about Kaoru?” Kokoro broke the silence. 

The butterflies in her stomach died, and she pulled her knees to her chest in a weird act of self defense. There was no way she couldn’t tell Kokoro, and she supposed it had always been inevitable. One look in the right direction and her knees were jelly, every time. If only Kokoro knew the true sway she held. It would be disastrous.

“I’ll tell you a little bit. It’s personal though. Private stuff. I only found out because of… stupid reasons I guess. I just mean, it’s not something you should go talking about. Can you promise me that?”

“Like a pinky promise? I can do that.”

“Alright,” Misaki untangled their hands and held up her pinky. “Pinky promise me then. If you break the promise, the bear suit stays on.”

Kokoro nodded enthusiastically and held up her pinky. Eternal contract forged, Misaki prepared to break her own promise, for no real reason other than that Kokoro was her best friend. If there were consequences later, she would handle them.

“Remember when you saw Aya and Hina together that one time? And I told you not to talk about it?”

“Mhm. I haven’t talked about it, not even once!”

“Right, right. Well, sometimes you have responsibilities, and you need to be, uh, responsible… about them.... So when you have things going on in your life that might get in the way, you have to keep some things private. Even if you feel like you shouldn’t have to. I don’t know if that’s right or wrong or anything, this stuff is new to me.”

Kokoro nodded, a good indication that she was actually listening.

“So uh, Kaoru, she has some things going on in her life… and it’s really important to her that nobody knows about it. You know, so her responsibilities don’t change. She’s bad at hiding it- I mean, she’s not bad at it, it’s just the kind of thing that’s really hard to not talk about. Like, I don’t really know that feeling, so I guess I’m not totally sure about it. She’s just worried about people finding out who aren’t supposed to. So she has to keep it a secret.”

“I see,” Kokoro said. “So you found out the secret by accident?”

“Sort of. It wasn’t something I was supposed to know. But I did talk to Kaoru about it, and she’s going to do her best to work with what she’s got. I don’t think she would want you worrying about her, she can handle herself.”

“Well, as long as she knows we’re always here to help, I trust her to tell us when she’s ready. And I promise I won’t tell anyone else, not even Hagumi.”

Misaki let out a breath she didn’t even realize she’d been holding.

“That’s good. Yeah, just don’t say anything about it. If she’s ever ready, she’ll say something.”

“Right,” Kokoro pumped her fist, “ when she’s ready. I hope she knows she can always count on us.”

“I’m certain she does. You make a pretty good habit of telling us that all the time.”

“Well it’s true! You can count on me too, just like how I can count on you, right?”

“Uh-huh. I’m sure there’s a reason you use me as an encyclopedia when you don’t know something.”

“Well, now that you mention it there is something I wanted to ask you about,” Kokoro said. The room was almost totally dark now, the only light coming in from the street lamps outside. She should probably offer to let Kokoro stay the night.

“And what’s that?”

“I guess I can use Aya and Hina as an example too.”

Uh-oh. Misaki wasn’t sure if she wanted to know where this was going anymore.

“Have you ever felt like that?”

“Felt what?” Misaki struggled to reign in her wobbling voice. “Like, liked someone? No, I don’t know what that feels like.”

“Not exactly that. But kind of? That, but girls.”

“You’re asking me if I like girls too?”

If the lights were on right now, Misaki was sure she’d be as red as a tomato. She couldn’t even tell if Kokoro was bothered at all by what she’d asked. Maybe Misaki was just a prude. Kokoro sounded as though she were just asking a normal question, like what one plus one was. It was a little on topic, what with Kaoru and all, but she’d never revealed that Kaoru’s thing had anything to do with another girl, or even relationships at all. What place was this conversation coming from?

“Yep. Do you? Have you thought about it?”

“No,” she answered hastily. “I’ve never thought about it. I can’t really help you with that one.”

The most she’d thought about it, ever, was when it had to do with other people who didn’t want to be found out. There was nothing to think about.

“Oh,” Kokoro replied, “well that’s alright. Maybe we can talk about it later.”

“I’m not good with that stuff. You should ask someone else.”

“Hm, I feel better asking you though. You know everything.”

“I don’t,” Misaki shut her down, knowing she was coming across as cruel without intending to. “We should make dinner or something. It’s probably better if you stay the night here instead of walking home in the dark.”

They both knew Kokoro could have a ride out front in five minutes. It just seemed simpler for her to stay. Then Misaki wouldn’t have to go to bed and lay awake for five hours wondering if Kokoro was upset with her for not having the answers this time. The conversation had ended, the moment overstaying its welcome. It was the longest sixty seconds of seriousness Misaki had experienced in her entire life.

As she stood up and headed for the kitchen to throw something together, Kokoro remained on the floor in her room, sitting by herself in the dark.


End file.
